Kieschnick's Latest Folly Makes the Wall Street Journal

Evangelistic Messages from Satan - LCMS Ablaze!

Norm Teigen and other blogs have noticed the growing furor in the LCMS over the Kieschnick administration's latest folly.

But now the Wall Street Journal has made it a feature story. I have copied a few sections only from the story, to avoid being sued by R. Murdock.

On its last show, on March 17, listeners learned about the life and faith of St. Patrick; scientific and philosophical arguments in defense of the human embryo; the excommunication of two Roman Catholic women who claimed ordination; and the controversy surrounding the sermons of Barack Obama's pastor, Jeremiah Wright.

Despite the show's popularity, low cost and loyal donor base, Mr. Wilken and Jeff Schwarz, the producer of "Issues, Etc.," were dismissed without explanation on Tuesday of Holy Week. Within hours, the program's Web site -- which provided access to past episodes and issues of its magazine -- had disappeared. Indeed, all evidence that the show ever existed was removed.

***

GJ - The Church Growth gurus cannot stand having their pet false doctrines criticized. WELS reacted the same way when I exposed their doctrinal apostasy by quoting their so-called evangelism material. Much of it was supplied by WELS pastors who refused to do any heavy lifting themselves. The CLC (sic) - ditto.

More from the WS Journal:

Since Mr. Kieschnick narrowly won election in 2001, the church has embarked on a program, called Ablaze!, that has the admirable goal of "reaching 100 million unreached and uncommitted people with the Gospel by 2017," the 500th anniversary of the Reformation. Historically the church kept statistics on baptisms. Now, however, it keeps a tally of what it calls "critical events." On March 17 a man reported discussing Jesus with his waitress -- and the Ablaze! count went up by one.

One congregation near St. Louis took a $25,000 Ablaze! grant and used it to put up billboards with kitschy statements purporting to come from the devil (e.g., "JeffersonHills Church Sucks," signed "Satan"). A Michigan mission congregation replaced the historical message of Lent with a speaker series on sex. Following marketing principles, neither congregation uses the word "Lutheran" in its name or advertising campaign. While "Issues, Etc." never criticized Mr. Kieschnick or his colleagues, its attacks against shallow church marketing included mention of some approaches embraced by the current leadership. It opposed, for instance, the emergent church -- an attempt to accommodate postmodern culture by blending philosophies and practices from throughout the church's history -- and the Purpose Driven Church movement, which reorients the church's message toward self-help and self-improvement.

***

GJ - I recall many LCMS, WELS, and ELS pastors standing by, refusing to say anything against the Church Growth Movement. They saw it in their own denomination but wanted the easy road for themselves, too. There is no larger fraternity than the clergy who whisper their dissent during coffee and silence themselves in the actual meetings.

Paul McCain, MDiv, three years of parish experience, continues to pose as a confessional Lutheran, but the Barry-McCain administration was one of appeasement and compromise. The only people treated rudely were the conservatives who elected Barry. In fact, the only way to view the friendly side of McCain is to read his posts at the ELCA-centric American Lutheran Publicity Bureau's blogsite.

Al Barry, the LCMS savior, according to the politicians, did nothing against the Church Growth Movement and said nothing against it. McCain was furious when I pointed that out to him in the Purple Palace. Thus another infallible reign took over from the infallible Bohlmann. The papacy has nothing on the Missouri Synod. The Church of Rome admits to having heretic popes. Missouri, WELS, and the Little Sect on the Prairie do not.

McCain spent 9 years in the Purple Palace doing nothing about Benke (except granting him absolution) and nothing about St. John, Ellisville, a few miles away. I hope we hear no tongue-clucking from McCain about this latest episode. He is the midwife of apostasy, the enabler of Church Growth and Purpose-Driven nonsense. If you seek McCain's monument, look around you.

Yes, I can hear the Wisconsin and Norwegian tongues clucking from here. "The LCMS suppresses the name Lutheran? How terrible!" All their market-driven congregations-- like CrossWalk, CrossTalk, CrossRoads, CrossPurposes, and DoubleCross--will not notice because they do not read Lutheran news anyway.

Rolf Preus (Rolf Synod) will shudder, in print. His father got the Church Growth degree program going at Concordia Seminary, Ft. Wayne.

Jay Webber, ELS, will suffer acute bouts of telephonic Schadenfreude, forgetting perhaps his studied silence on these topics for decades now.

Episcopal Church Tactics Should Warn Lutherans About the Future

PB Jefferts-Schori, Filled with Wrath

NORTH DAKOTA: Orthodox Bishop Denies License to Lesbian Priest

News Analysis

By David W. Virtue
www.virtueonline.org
3/25/2008

The Evangelical Anglo-Catholic Bishop of North Dakota, the Rt. Rev. Michael Smith has denied the Rev. Gayle Baldwin a license to function as a priest in the diocese because she is an open and avowed lesbian.

Baldwin, 62, is an associate professor of religion at the University of North Dakota. She was ordained an Episcopal priest in 1980. She came out as a lesbian a decade ago in Wyoming, where she has a license to preach and administer the sacraments. She came to the university in 2000, according to news reports.

She blasted Smith in an open letter saying he refused to grant her a license to fulfill her ordination vows in the state of North Dakota. "His reason is that my life partner, whom God has given me to love and cherish, is a woman and not a man. He has stated that he will only grant a license to a priest who is celibate or married," she raged.

Bishop Smith responded, "I have been clear from the beginning what my expectations are, that is fidelity in marriage and abstinence for those not called to marriage." Bishop Smith is the leader of nearly 3,000 Episcopalians in North Dakota.

In a letter VOL obtained, Smith said it is "a confused time, for the Episcopal Church as the issue is debated." He is upholding what the church always has taught.

The bishop who succeeded Bishop Andy Fairfield (who resigned from The Episcopal Church and was later deposed) says he is following a policy set out in the 2004 Windsor Report, which called for a truce until the matter is settled. It also asked Episcopal bishops not to ordain gays and lesbians or to hold gay marriage ceremonies.

Outraged by his refusal to license her, Baldwin wrote an open letter to Mrs. Katharine Jefferts Schori, TEC Presiding Bishop, and all the Bishops of The Episcopal Church noting especially homogenital New Hampshire Bishop Gene Robinson complaining bitterly about the bishop's "denial" in extending her a license.

"I am writing all of you as a response to the recent refusal of Bp. Michael Smith to grant me a license to fulfill my ordination vows in the state of North Dakota. The reason he has refused me has nothing to do with my character, nor my skills and gifts of ministry. His reason is that my life partner, whom God has given me to love and cherish is a woman and not a man. He has stated that he will only grant a license to a priest who is celibate or married. Since we cannot be formally married, our family is not considered legitimate by the church."

She went on to rage saying that, "If a bishop can do this to one, then anyone is potentially at risk. This is why I am writing this open letter to all so that we might begin a dialogical conversation over this matter."

Bishop Smith "needs to be challenged, on the issue of denying me a license to do what God called and what the church already has ordained me to do," Baldwin wrote.

"I am trying to be faithful to the scriptures and trying to be faithful to the tradition of the church, while at the same time being open to what God might be doing in a new way," Smith said. "We are in a period of discernment. It's not an issue of civil rights."

Smith said the diocese was mostly a diocese of moderately conservative and moderately liberal people. "We are not of one mind on the issue, so it's much more important for me to be consistent with the policy."

Before coming to the diocese Baldwin wrote saying that she was warned by Bishop Bruce Caldwell of Wyoming that then Bishop Andy Fairfield of North Dakota was rabidly against affirming the full humanity of gays, lesbians and transgender people.

On Maundy Thursday Baldwin led a service in Christus Rex Lutheran Campus Center at UND, an informal time in a fireside room. She did not serve the Eucharist as an Episcopal priest, both to respect the nondenominational aspect of the group and to avoid violating Episcopal law, since she isn't licensed to practice in the Diocese of North Dakota. About 38 people attended.

Dr. Louie Crew, The Episcopal Church's first sodomite emeritus and founder of the pansexual organization known as Integrity wrote at his blog, "I have no doubt that Bishop Smith has canonical license to bully Gayle in this matter, but he has no such license as a Christian. I grieve that Gayle must yet take up her cross."

By going public, Baldwin is trying to garner sympathy and support for her lesbianism. Because the Episcopal Church has formally accepted homosexuals and lesbians to all offices in the church, Ms. Baldwin believes she has an ecclesiastical, if not divine right, to yell and scream at the bishop for denying her access to an Episcopal pulpit in his diocese.

The truth is, he is well within his rights to deny her. There is no canon that demands or necessitates that he give her a job in his diocese. Not even Mrs. Jefferts Schori can coerce him, though she may try to do so by withholding money as a tool and weapon of the national church along with a few dioceses, who give money to support Native American Episcopalians in the diocese. Money is a powerful tool and it will be interesting to see how far this plays out.

If using the canons for coercion is possible then one needs to ask why is it that for nearly a quarter of a century, evangelical graduates of Ambridge-based Trinity Episcopal School for Ministry have been systematically denied pulpits in liberal Episcopal dioceses. The Rev. Dr. Paul Zahl complained mightily about this when he was president and dean of the School.

Consider, too, that Charles E. Bennison, the now inhibited Bishop of Pennsylvania, refused to license the Rev. Professor Allen Guelzo, Henry R. Luce Professor of the Civil War Era and Professor of History at Gettysburg College, a brilliant Lincoln scholar and former REC member who was ordained into the Episcopal Church by the Bishop of Quincy, the Rt. Rev. Keith Ackerman. Guelzo, who resides in a Philadelphia suburb, was denied a license to preach because, as VOL was told, he was too old and too smart. Bennison's rejection flew in the face of ageism, another Episcopal sin along with homophobia....one of many Bennison has committed and for which he will shortly receive just retribution.

Furthermore, no bishop did more to exclude straight white males from his diocese than did the former Bishop of Washington, Ronald Haines. For over seven years, he refused to allow or ordain heterosexual men in his diocese, a stance that shocked incoming bishop John Chane when he was told. An Anglo-Catholic writer living in the Diocese of Washington noted that, during the tenure of Bishop Jane Dixon, black straight men were not ordained, either. It might also account for the fact that if it weren't for the Soper Fund, the diocese would be bankrupt.

Another hater of orthodox Episcopalians, specifically Anglo-Catholics, is the Bishop of Long Island, Orris Walker. He has managed during his tenure to make life so miserable for orthodox Episcopalians, whose only "sin" was to use the 1928 Prayer Book, that he publicly and privately berated them and systematically drove them out of the diocese. Most have now fled the diocese.

More recently, there was the case of a married Nashotah House graduate whom Bishop J. Jon Bruno refused to ordain in the Diocese of Los Angeles. Did the seminarian take his grievance public? No, he stated on his blog that he would not discuss it other than to say that he would seek ordination in the Diocese of Fort Worth.

If Bishop Michael Smith can be coerced or bullied into submission, then the sodomite and pro-sodomite lobby in The Episcopal Church will have won over the canons, canons that are now being liberally misapplied in the removal of Bishops John David Schofield and William Cox.

***

PB: Keep questions about sexuality in conversation
The Boston Globe reports:

Saying "I don't believe that there is any will in this church to move backward," the top official of the Episcopal Church USA said yesterday that the election of an openly gay bishop in New Hampshire has been "a great blessing" despite triggering intense controversy and talk of possible schism.

In an interview during a visit to Boston, Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori compared the gay rights struggle to battles over slavery and women's rights, and said she believes that it has become a vocation for the Episcopal Church "to keep questions of human sexuality in conversation, and before not just the rest of our own church, but the rest of the world."

WELS Lutherans For Life/Walter Drake Catalogue

Ideal for the executive director's office.

Christian Life Resources subjects itself to the doctrine and practice of the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod, but it is not supervised or funded by the WELS budget or its administrators. (Warning on Christian Life Resources site.)

The Wisconsin contingent left Lutherans For Life because they did not want to become polluted by the unionism and false doctrine of the LCMS. Don't spray your keyboard with morning coffee. Put the mug down before reading the daily Ichabod.

So WELS LFL went into stealth mode. WELS LFL is Christian Life Resources now. The newsletter artfully conceals WELS membership from the readers. Yes, the still small voice is there, but camouflaged as much as possible.

The latest newsletter is packed full of gift catalogue stuff. I wonder how much is made in China. All the items for sale raise the issue of tax-exempt status. Is this a commercial gift store, a Lutheran Walter Drake catalogue, or para-church organization? Who owns the gift business, which has a separate website?

Family Treasures and Gifts
A ministry of Christian Life Resources
2949 N. Mayfair Road, Suite 309
Milwaukee, WI 53222-4304
1-800-729-9535

They have a store set up at world headquarters for CLR. I would love to send in some agents to purchase some superfluous nose hair clippers and other staples of the Walter Drake catalogue. "Do you have coffee mugs that say, like, What Would Waldo Werning Do?" WWWWD.

Family Treasures and Gifts Dot Com overlaps the website with Christian Life Resources, just like Church and Change used to do with the Love Shack website.

My favorite gift is the frame for wedding photos. The idea is to buy two: one for the first, the other for the second wedding. When the ex walks into the office, demanding more alimony, flip the second marriage photo frame against the wall and show the first wedding only. There is no better way to make a witness in this benighted world.

The last time I looked, CLR had $2 million in the bank.

Oh! Oh! Oh! I Found Antithetical Statements in the Book of Concord

"Now what do I do?"

We used to laugh about the febrile WELS leaders having CG-asms. They would announce with great excitement that they just discovered "another Church Growth Principle."

I have just discovered antithetical statements in the Book of Concord.

All these years I have been pummeled for stating that marketing the Gospel is false doctrine. "That is Christian-bashing" I was told. I have been eviscerated in public for saying Fuller Seminary is the Great Sewer of Protestantism in America. "That is legalism. They are Christians. We can learn from them, too. I went to the Ohio Conference to deal with legalism down there." (Valleskey, on his Spoiling the Egyptians masterpiece, plagiarized from Larry Crab, who plagiarized Augustine, each crib far dumber than the previous one).

Here is one antithetical introduction in the Book of Concord:

From these, the antithesis also, that is, the false contrary dogmas, are manifest, namely, that in addition to the errors recounted above also the following and similar ones, which conflict with the explanation now published, must be censured, exposed, and rejected, as when it is taught:

That is from the Righteousness of Faith section in the Formula of Concord. Not it is not the Righteousness of No Faith, as the UOJ people would claim. They should read their Book of Concord, that big fat book behind the pile of synodical 3-ring binders.

Oh! Oh! Oh! I found another one:

38] However, it by no means follows thence that we are to say simpliciter and flatly: Good works are injurious to believers for or as regards their salvation; for in believers good works are indications of salvation when they are done propter veras causas et ad veros fines (from true causes and for true ends), that is, in the sense in which God requires them of the regenerate, Phil. 1, 20; for it is God's will and express command that believers should do good works, which the Holy Ghost works in believers, and with which God is pleased for Christ's sake, and to which He promises a glorious reward in this life and the life to come.

39] For this reason, too, this proposition is censured and rejected in our churches, because as a flat statement it is false and offensive, by which discipline and decency might be impaired, and a barbarous, dissolute, secure, Epicurean life be introduced and strengthened. For what is injurious to his salvation a person should avoid with the greatest diligence. (Good Works, Formula of Concord)

Censured and rejected? Strong words. A good test of Lutheran knowledge is this - Which man promoted good works as necessary? Which one denounced good works as injurious to salvation? Both men were important leaders after Luther. Major - good works are necessary. Amsdorf - good works are injurious. Can anyone imagine this happening today? No, the synods are too busy proving everyone is infallible by kicking out anyone who dissents.

The old Synodical Conference will keep on breeding Universalism by teaching justification without faith, absolution of the world without the Word. One man went to a dreary Easter service where everyone was promised death. "But that's OK. Everyone here is going to heaven." As he said, there is not much preaching that can be done with UOJ.

It is, therefore, dangerous and wrong to convert the Gospel, properly so called, as distinguished from the Law, into a preaching of repentance or reproof [a preaching of repentance, reproving sin]. For otherwise, if understood in a general sense of the entire doctrine, also the Apology says several times that the Gospel is a preaching of repentance and the forgiveness of sins. Meanwhile, however, the Apology also shows that the Gospel is properly the promise of the forgiveness of sins and of justification through Christ, but that the Law is a doctrine which reproves sins and condemns. (Law and Gospel, Formula of Concord)

Dangerous and wrong? Are they talking about Paul Kelm, who starts with the Gospel and moves to the Law? Or Wayne Mueller? Oh my.

Luther did not start the Reformation, by the grace of God, because he discovered the Gospel. After all, Spalatin explained the Gospel to him. The Gospel never went away. Luther mortally wounded the Whore of Babylon by distinguishing between sound doctrine and false doctrine. The pope (like our Lutheran popes today) could not stand antithetical statements. Without them, anything can be claimed, no matter what is intended.

Lutherans teach salvation by grace. So do Roman Catholics. A Lutheran/Roman Catholic conversation can be quite pleasant until one defines what is and what is not grace.

The Lutheran organizations have adopted a Roman Catholic attitude about doctrine - You can teach and believe whatever you want as long as you do not denounce anything. That is why pockets of dissent exist here and there, happily chirping to each other about how bad things are, but silent about false doctrine. A Roman Catholic priest can march in a religious procession with the seminary professors of the ELS and no one objects. An archbishop pedophile can teach WELS and the public while district popes defend and deny.

Ichabodians - watch and listen as pastors studiously avoid doing what the Book of Concord practices: publishing the antithetical statement. Until that happens consistently, the visible Lutheran Church will remain in the Slough of Despond.

An Unworthy Prayer

"Please make him stop quoting our leaders. Amen."

One of my students, ready to graduate, said, "What synod are you?" I said, "You are Lutheran, aren't you?" He denied it three times.

Non-Lutherans ask, if they know us fairly well, "What syNOD?" Only a trained Lutheran would say, with proper pronunciation, "What synod?"

Later he admitted to being raised Missouri Synod. He has served as a lay-pastor in a Pentecostal denomination. Many people tell me they used to be Lutheran, and this is definitely not a Lutheran town. Phoenix has the second-largest concentration of Mormons in America.

Why are there so many former Lutherans? The whining about verbatim quotations on Ichabod may give a clue.

Objections to quotations fall into two categories, both covered by the iconic prayer portrayed above:
1 - Do not quote the great Lutheran theologians of the past.
2 - Do not quote the apostate Lutheran leaders of today.

The Scriptures are plain and simple to comprehend. They have the power of the Holy Spirit to convert and to sustain faith. Unfortunately, people have battled to obscure the meaning of God's Word.

One cause is the promiscuous publication of Bible translations.

Another cause is the fog of Biblical interpretation, created by the last century of unbelievers who could find no other job than teaching the Scriptures to innocent seminarians.

The most destructive is the promotion of a union theology which dare not speak its name. Recessional Lutherans have spent the last 30 years leading people out of the faith via a cynical, discount Reformed-Pentecostal marketing strategy or a mystical and deceitful Roman/Eastern Orthodox confidence game. Either way, the duped are made to feel the real Church is anything but the Lutheran Church. But this goes under the banner of Confessional Lutheranism.

Luther properly identified the danger of all false doctrine in taking away from the glory of God, the clear message of the Scriptures. Can anything be more Satanic than taking people's attention away from God at work in the Means of Grace and getting them to focus on organizational strategy?

One WELS circuit pastor, driven out of the ministry by his brothers, said this, "We used to be a well run group of people. We never talked about the organization. Now that is all we talk about and the synod is falling apart." His sin against the Holy Spirit (from the Wisconsin perspective) was being mildly critical of the Church Growth Movement. His years of faithful service counted for nothing.

As long as the organization comes first, any lie is better than facing the truth. One WELS pastor wrote to say that he learned about his district, thousands of miles away from me, by reading my doctrinal bulletins. "You know more about what is happening a few miles away from me than I do." Rather than deal openly with the cause of multiple lawsuits and statutory rape by church workers, the district concealed the truth from everyone.

District Pope Robert Mueller said, at an official meeting, "If I tell the congregation that they are calling an adulterer, they don't want him." He was excusing his deceptions. A layman was astounded. "You don't tell them?" Later, Mueller complained about the need to certify that his clergy were not sex offenders. Psst - there is something in the Bible about that. Several places, I think.

As long as people think their job is to make the organization strong and prosperous, they can be led to and fro in error's maze confounded. Strangely, the Episcopalians have seen the light and reacted, with far more courage than can be found among the Lutherans. Bishops, usually the most timid of clergy, are leading groups of congregations away from apostasy.

Lutherans have lost their trust in the pure Word of God. They have lost track of their own theologians.

I estimate there are three approaches to the Book of Concord.

ELCA indifference - Oh yeah, this Book of Concord thing. I have the new edition.

LCMS/WELS/ELS rabbit's foot. I read it a little once. Had to in seminary. Not relevant today. Yes, we have a kiwi subscription to it. Quia? Oh, forgot. Yes, not a tennis subscription. Quatenus? Whatever.

The Great Discovery. Some have found that the Book of Concord deals with the great spiritual issues of all time. The Book of Concord is a one volume collection of Biblical exposition, the clearest possible teaching about God's Word. The Book of Concord collects the ancient confessions (Ecumenical Creeds) Luther's writings (Small and Large Catechisms, Smalcald Articles), Melanchthon's (Augsburg Confession and the Apology, Treatise), and the Concordists (Formula of Concord and the Book of Concord itself).

Easter Service Was Recorded

"I missed your service."

Grey Goose, a member of the _____ District of WELS, wrote to say he missed the Bethany Lutheran Worship service.

Not exactly. The service was recorded and saved at the website. Click here for the location.

Worship services and educational programs will be saved at that location. We will probably need to place them on a separate site or use the Bethany blog, so people can tell Quasimodo from Cantate, worship from adult education.

Yes, the wonderful Latin names will be preserved. The Lutheran worship-nazis have decided that the laity are too dumb to know what the Latin names mean. Or perhaps the clergy no longer know and feel ashamed to say, "I don't know what Septuagesima means."

ELCA Report? I Didn't Read No ELCA Report. Lipstick? Haven't Seen It.

Another View on Easter

Like the Golden Sun Ascending Hymn

Like the golden sun ascending,
Breaking through the gloom of night,
On the earth His glory spending
So that darkness takes to flight,
Thus my Jesus from the grave
And death’s dismal, dreadful cave
Rose triumphant Easter morning
At the early purple dawning.

Thanks to Thee, O Christ victorious!
Thanks to Thee, O Lord of Life!
Death hath now no power o’er us,
Thou hast conquered in the strife.
Thanks because Thou didst arise
And hast opened Paradise!
None can fully sing the glory
Of the resurrection story.

Though I be by sin o’ertaken,
Though I lie in helplessness,
Though I be by friends forsaken
And must suffer sore distress,
Though I be despised, contemned,
And by all the world condemned,
Though the dark grave yawn before me,
Yet the light of hope shines o’er me.

Thou hast died for my transgression,
All my sins on Thee were laid;
Thou hast won for me salvation,
On the cross my debt was paid.
From the grave I shall arise
And shall meet Thee in the skies.
Death itself is transitory;
I shall lift my head in glory.

Grant me grace, O blessèd Savior,
And Thy Holy Spirit send
That my walk and my behavior
May be pleasing to the end;
That I may not fall again
Into death’s grim pit and pain,
Whence by grace Thou hast retrieved me
And from which Thou hast relieved me.

For the joy Thy advent gave me,
For Thy holy, precious Word;
For Thy baptism, which doth save me,
For Thy blest communion board;
For Thy death, the bitter scorn,
For Thy resurrection morn,
Lord, I thank Thee and extol Thee,
And in heaven I shall behold Thee.

One of our greatest Lutheran hymn-writers is Thomas Hansen Kingo.

Bethany Lutheran Worship will feature the great Lutheran hymns at each service. There are many fine non-Lutherans hymns. Beyond question, the finest examples of Christian hymnody are found in the Lutheran Church.

Easter Service

We had some audio problems during the Bethany Lutheran Worship service. I learned afterwards that it was probably the computer calendar program trying to remind me of a date. And you thought noisy kids were the worst problem in church!

We had 51 households viewing at one point. That indicates far more interest than I would have imagined. Our technology team is stunned.

Fellow pastors, I suggest doing this. The shut-ins and scattered members can watch, no matter what the weather. The broadcast can be saved and viewed later. I am learning how to use those files on a separate website.

Independent pastors - this is ideal.

The congregation needs a fairly recent computer. Our broadcast computer is a laptop, about five years old. It works fine. The congregation also needs a webcam ($100) and broadband (DSL or cable). Viewers will do better with broadband but can get by with 56k. How many grannies have Internet? Plenty. The alternative is an audio service through a telephone teleconference bridge.

Anyone can view the service. A 56k phone line will mean that the live service will be out of sync, as one viewer told me. Perhaps the downloaded file will view better than live. The trouble is, downloading video at 56k can be troublesome.

I used to wonder why I got into computer science just in time for the boom to collapse. The technology I have learned has been useful ever since, but I have a lot to learn. I hope to keep up with my grandson. His father will probably teach him to count in hexadecimal. 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-a-b-c-d-e-f. ff= 255 or 11111111.

Who Moved My Cheese? For Lutheran Pastors

Who Moved My Cheese? is a great little book for understanding change in the job market.

I mentioned it in a class of graduating seniors, mostly business majors. Most of them had read the book. Some companies buy it for everyone.

The concept is simple. Four mice enjoy getting their cheese at one location and build their lives around it. The cheese diminishes and disappears. Hem and Haw get angry, wondering when the cheese will come back. The other two mice put on their running shoes and go looking.

Finally Haw decides to go looking for cheese and enjoys the chase. One moral of the story is - Someone will always move the cheese.

Lutheran pastors are peculiar in their dependency on Holy Mother Synod to provide the cheese. They fear offending the great Cheese-Provider. No, not God - the district pope, Who is infallible, vindictive, and easily annoyed.

Lutheran clergy mice constantly find their cheese moving. People age and die. The best members relocate for better jobs. The worst members never leave, except chest-high, and then not soon enough. Other Lutheran clergy mice steal their cheese without shame.

The answer, the clergy think, is to get rid of competing clergy mice, to dominate the great cheese supplies, and to worship the great Cheese-Provider. They do not admit to worshiping the District Pope. Instead, they say, "I love the synod." They have an excuse for every wrongful action and every false doctrine: "That is a g-r-e-y area of Scripture," and "That could be understood correctly." Frowning while saying those bromides is a good idea. Stretching the words out places an emphasis on the thoughtfulness of the reply. If someone asks about clergy mice felonies, they squeak sharply, "Who told you?"

The demographic research--which the Lutheran clergy mice trust so much--shows the cheese is going away.

Teaching the Gospel in a Secular Setting

KJV John 10:27 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me:

When I applied for a license to teach in higher education, I did not ask for accreditation in religion. I was teaching computers at the time. The certificate came back: Computer science and religion.

When I began teaching at a business school, I never thought of teaching religion. I was told they needed instructors in computer science. Soon I was teaching writing and world religion. The school decided people needed to know more about world culture. The class is very popular as an elective, so I teach it all over Arizona.

I added another for-profit school to my schedule last year. The Biblical courses are required, so I teach Old and New Testament.

I get to teach whatever I want at both schools. I teach the efficacy of the Word, the authority of the Scriptures, the Six-Day Creation. I quote Luther often. That always riled up Lutheran leaders (Lutheran in Name Only - LINOs), but others are quite respectful. I teach Catholics, Muslims, Evangelicals, ordained pagan priestesses, and atheists.

I lost track of how many books have been given away to students. I am glad the apostates have given me so many opportunities. They did not mean to do it, but things worked out that way. There are many ways for the sheep to hear the Good Shepherd's voice.

Bethany Worship Questions and Comments

Norman Teigen has left a new comment on your post "Dial-Up Works with Ustream":

Greg,

I don't understand how you can set up a congregation as a Minnesota corporation when the actual site is in Arizona?

Norman Teigen
ELS layman

***

GJ - Norm, Bethany Lutheran Church began in New Ulm, Minnesota, in 1998, as an independent congregation. We hired a lawyer and incorporated there, then got our IRS number. We have been operating as Bethany with teleconference bridges.

Kuske's LRP in Columbus did not get tax-exempt status, which made things sticky for someone who donated a large sum. Kuske is the financial genius of the Michigan District, WELS.

***

A. Nony Mouse has left a new comment on your post "Dial-Up Works with Ustream":

Anything to make a buck, eh, "Dr." Jackson? Amazing how a church you started in MN now finds its way to AZ. I wonder what the MN Attorney General's office would say about that. Maybe I'll send him your blog and he can investigate.

***

GJ - Rev. Mouse took a long time for his latest squeak. He was going to investigate my degrees in a previous post. If he had the guts to do so, he would have to retract and apologize. That would be precedent setting for him and for WELS. They are bothered by people who earn degrees at accredited institutions.

I explained matters above, responding to Norm Teigen's polite, signed comment. Has anyone else noticed that the nasty notes are always anonymous, that the anonymous writers express their terror of becoming known?

ELCA has its headquarters in Chicago and is incorporated in Minnesota. Rev. Mouse needs to brush up on his Lutheran doctrine and on his corporate law expertise.

I have been a tent-maker for 12 years and enjoying it.

KJV Acts 18:1 After these things Paul departed from Athens, and came to Corinth; 2 And found a certain Jew named Aquila, born in Pontus, lately come from Italy, with his wife Priscilla; (because that Claudius had commanded all Jews to depart from Rome:) and came unto them. 3 And because he was of the same craft, he abode with them, and wrought: for by their occupation they were tentmakers.

Most of my work is teaching, and the opportunities are growing. I was not looking for a new activity, but I am pleased it is working out so well. I expected about six households viewing the Good Friday service. We peaked at 21. I know we had East Coast and West Coast viewers because they wrote (and signed their names)!

Dial-Up Works with Ustream

Lilies, by Norma Boeckler

One of our intrepid readers tried to watch the Good Friday service on a dial-up, 56K telephone line, and it worked.

I confused the broadcast requirement (broadband, CPU speed) with the receiving requirement. I hope others will try it and let me know how it works for them.

Bethany's email is bethanylutheranworship@gmail.com.

Bethany Lutheran Church is an ecclesiastical corporation, registered in Minnesota, so donations are tax-deductible. We are working toward every Sunday services and other features, such as educational broadcasts on the Book of Concord, Catholic Lutheran Protestant, and other doctrinal topics. The broadcasts can be saved and provided on a website. That will be another item to learn. Fortunately, we have consultants in broadcasting, wireless, and the Internet.

If you wish to donate, the address is:

Bethany Lutheran Church
6421 W. Poinsettia Drive
Glendale, AZ 85304

A good friend is working with me to get previously published books on Lulu.com. We are finishing up Jesus, Priceless Treasure. The next new book will be a book about Jesus for small children.

I would like to encourage Lutheran pastors to investigate Lulu.com and Internet broadcasting. Lutherans can be independent of the apostate synods and thrive.

Easter Service

The Feast of the Resurrection of Our Lord

KJV 1 Corinthians 5:6 Your glorying is not good. Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump? 7 Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us: 8 Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

KJV Mark 16:1 And when the sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome, had bought sweet spices, that they might come and anoint him. 2 And very early in the morning the first day of the week, they came unto the sepulchre at the rising of the sun. 3 And they said among themselves, Who shall roll us away the stone from the door of the sepulchre? 4 And when they looked, they saw that the stone was rolled away: for it was very great. 5 And entering into the sepulchre, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, clothed in a long white garment; and they were affrighted. 6 And he saith unto them, Be not affrighted: Ye seek Jesus of Nazareth, which was crucified: he is risen; he is not here: behold the place where they laid him. 7 But go your way, tell his disciples and Peter that he goeth before you into Galilee: there shall ye see him, as he said unto you. 8 And they went out quickly, and fled from the sepulchre; for they trembled and were amazed: neither said they any thing to any man; for they were afraid.

Lord God, heavenly Father, who didst deliver Thy Son for our offenses, and didst raise Him again for our justification: We beseech Thee, grant us Thy Holy Spirit, that He may rule and govern us according to Thy will; graciously keep us in the true faith; defend us from all sins, and after this life raise us unto eternal life, through the same, Thy beloved Son, who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost, one true God, world without end. Amen.

Easter Sunday

The Hymn (Gerhardt) vss. 1-8 #192
The Invocation p. 15
The Confession of Sins
The Absolution
The Introit p. 16
The Gloria Patri
The Kyrie p. 17
The Gloria in Excelsis
The Salutation and Collect p. 19
The Epistle and Gradual 1 Corinthians 5:6-7
The Gospel Mark 16:1-8
Glory be to Thee, O Lord!
Praise be to Thee, O Christ!
The Nicene Creed p. 22
The Sermon Hymn vss. 1-4 #199
The Sermon
Christ the Victor

The Offertory p. 22
The Hymn (Kingo) #207
The Preface p. 24
The Sanctus p. 26
The Lord's Prayer p. 27
The Words of Institution
The Agnus Dei p. 28
The Nunc Dimittis p. 29
The Benediction p. 31
The Hymn vss. 1-5 #341

Mark 16:6 And he saith unto them, Be not affrighted: Ye seek Jesus of Nazareth, which was crucified: he is risen; he is not here: behold the place where they laid him. 7 But go your way, tell his disciples and Peter that he goeth before you into Galilee: there shall ye see him, as he said unto you.

Easter Sunday remains the most religious Sunday of the year. This day marks the resurrection of Christ, His victory over death, our greatest enemy. Every Sunday marks His triumph. The earliest Christians gathered each Sunday at dawn and sang hymns. The rising of the sun reminded them of the trip to the Empty Tomb. Sunday was renamed in Revelation – the Lord’s Day:

KJV Revelation 1:10 I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day, and heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet,

The actual event was predicted by Christ and yet a shock to His followers. That shock should not surprise us. Believers often find themselves forgetful of God’s promises, prone to despair, pessimistic about what God can do, sunk in the Slough of Despond, as Bunyan described it in The Pilgrim’s Progress.

The women went to prepare a corpse. The men were in hiding “for fear of the Jews.” We have no record of Jews hunting for them, but they were locked in a room. Fear does that to people. The disciples trusted their knowledge, experience, and feelings. When we trust those things instead of the Word, fear determines all our actions. Faith is gone, at least for a time.

The women headed for the tomb, worried. Those worries should make us smile. The sparse narrative of the Resurrection gives us details which the Holy Spirit determined were important for all believers. The women were worried. Why? The tomb was empty. We know that. The stone door had already been taken down, to show everyone that the tomb was already empty. But the women worried. Who will roll that monstrous rock for us? Their reasoning was superb. I have a small slab of rock attached to a floor-lamp, to make it steady. Two of us men had trouble getting it to move across the clay tile and into place again. That was nothing compared to a stone covering the entrance to a tomb. The reasoning was good, but the women’s faith in the Word had vanished. So had the disciples’ faith, even though they heard the prediction three times:

KJV Mark 8:31 And he began to teach them, that the Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders, and of the chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.

KJV Mark 9:31 For he taught his disciples, and said unto them, The Son of man is delivered into the hands of men, and they shall kill him; and after that he is killed, he shall rise the third day.

KJV Mark 10:34 And they shall mock him, and shall scourge him, and shall spit upon him, and shall kill him: and the third day he shall rise again.

The question is not whether they knew this to be true. They knew it, men and women both, but their fears and anxieties drove faith away. The Gospels show us many examples of the frailties of the followers. They panicked in the boat during the storm. They accused Jesus of not caring if they died. They worried about having food after the Feeding of the Multitude. In other words, they were a lot like us.

God let them fall down on their own and picked them up again, many times over. Their faith in Jesus grew with each incident. They were tested and strengthened with the Word. We know faith drove out their fears because they died as witnesses to the Gospel. We only know of John living to an old age. What terrified them during Holy Week was their loss of the Savior and the threat to their lives. Later, they realized they had the Savior for eternity and no longer saw death as a threat.

The women approached the tomb, bent with worry, then saw the tomb was empty.

Recently a student in my New Testament class noted something important. Some artists show the angels letting Jesus out of the tomb, by rolling the stone away. The student saw that this was not Biblical and certainly not necessary. How could the creating Word be bound by the stone He fashioned in the beginning of time? – “whose Word the mountains rendeth” (Gerhardt, #142).

The women entered the tomb and saw an angel (a young man in a long, white robe) who addressed them. “You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified.” That may seem like an ordinary way to speak about the risen Lord. But the name is very specific. We get involved in the same issues today with identity theft and fraud. People have to prove who they are. Jesus, the Greek form of Joshua, was a common name. In Hebrew or Aramaic He was called Yeshuah – salvation. The first name and the city of origin identified Him as one particular man, a unique individual.

The women must have nodded yes, in stupefied amazement. The next statement is quite remarkable. The angel tells them the new identity of Jesus:

He is risen;

He is not here.

behold the place where they laid him.

We are used to various titles of Jesus: Son of God, Messiah, Savior, Redeemer, Son of Man, Lord. These two sentences define Jesus in the positive sense – He is risen—and also in the negative sense—He is not here.

Those are really the most powerful descriptions of Jesus, since all the titles are generally shared in one way or another with earthly rulers. Apostates glory in that knowledge. An emperor was called Lord. The kings of Israel were called Messiah-King, which means Anointed King. Christ is the Greek form of Anointed.

He is risen. He is not here. Both statements go far beyond human experience and reason. They can only define God Himself.

Jesus was raised for our justification. Lutherans like to quote that passage. Let’s look at it in context.

22 And therefore it was imputed to him [Abraham] for righteousness. 23 Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him; 24 But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead; 25 Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.

Righteousness shall be imputed to us also (we shall be justified) if we believe on Him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was turned over (betrayed, delivered) for our sins and lifted up for our justification.

Since we look back upon the death and resurrection of Christ, we may miss the association everyone had with His death. He died as a guilty man. There was a terrible stigma attached to someone who was crucified. We assume today that the death sentence means a horrible crime has been committed. The crucifixion was just one of hundreds unless it had special meaning. That was a difficult message to get across for the apostles. When Jesus rose from the tomb, He showed everyone that He did not die as a mortal sinner but as the crucified Messiah, the innocent Son of God.

Paul used an early Christian hymn or creed to repeat the same message to Timothy. God declared Jesus innocent in raising Him from the dead. (The resurrection is described both as God raising Him from the dead and as Jesus rising from the dead.)

The creed or hymn is more easily seen as poetry, thus:

KJV 1 Timothy 3:16 And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness:

· God was manifest in the flesh,
· justified in the Spirit,
· seen of angels,
· preached unto the Gentiles,
· believed on in the world,
· received up into glory.

The two passages complete the meaning of the death and resurrection of Christ. He died for our sins and became sin for us. He was so completely sin on the cross that God abandoned Him. “My God. My God. Why have you forsaken Me?” This cry of desolation shows how terribly Christ suffered for us in bearing our sins.

His Resurrection means that He did not deserve His punishment, that God declared Him righteous, innocent of all sin. He was raised for our justification because His death was meaningless if He was also a sinner.

Justification by faith is a continuous blessing enjoyed by Christians. We are daily forgiven:

I believe in the Holy Ghost; one holy Christian Church, the communion of saints; the forgiveness of sins; the resurrection of the body; and the life everlasting. Amen.
What does this mean?--Answer.

I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to Him; but the Holy Ghost has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith; even as He calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies the whole Christian Church on earth, and keeps it with Jesus Christ in the one true faith; in which Christian Church He forgives daily and richly all sins to me and all believers, and at the last day will raise up me and all the dead, and will give to me and to all believers in Christ everlasting life. This is most certainly true.

This continuous forgiveness is something we should cherish, but we take for granted, the way we take for granted anything in abundance. The difficulties of life bring to mind how important justification is, how great a treasure the Gospel is.

Easter Sunday reminds us at Bethany of those believers who have gone before us: Brenda Kiehler, Walt Boeckler, and my mother. We communed with them on earth, in preparation for that day when we would join them again.

Christ is risen! Hallelujah!
Risen our victorious Head!
Sing His praises! Hallelujah!
Christ is risen from the dead.
Gratefully our hearts adore Him
As His light once more appears,
Bowing down in joy before Him,
Rising up from grief and tears.


Chorus:
Christ is risen! Hallelujah!
Risen our victorious Head!
Sing His praises! Hallelujah!
Christ is risen from the dead.


Stanza 2:
Christ is risen! all the sadness
Of His earthly life is o'er;
Thro' the open gates of gladness
He returns to life once more;
Death and hell before Him bending,
He doth rise, the Victor now;
Angels, on His steps attending,
Glory 'round His wounded brow.


Chorus:


Stanza 3:
Christ is risen! henceforth never
Death or hell shall us enthral;
We are Christ's, in Him for ever
We have triumphed over all;
All the doubting and dejection
Of our trembling hearts have ceased;
'Tis His day of resurrection,
Let us rise and keep the feast.

Christ Is Risen! Hallelujah!

Lyrics ~ John S. B. Monsell, 1811 - 1875
Music ~ Frederick C. Maker, 1844 - 1927


Quotations

"When Christ arose, He brought with Him complete righteousness. For He arose for the sake of our righteousness, Romans 4:25. So then, when you, in a similar fashion, arise from sin through true repentance, you are justified from sins, for faith lays hold of this completed righteousness in Christ, by which we are enabled to stand before God."
Johann Gerhard Eleven Easter and Pentecostal Sermons, Malone: Repristination Press, 1996, p. 80. Romans 6:3-4; Romans 4:25.


"That the Lord Christ, after His resurrection, wishes peace to the disciples and eats the broiled fish and honey comb in their presence, and thereby portrays the benefit and fruit of His resurrection. For through His death and resurrection He has reconciled us with God, His heavenly Father, so that we may from now on, through faith in Him, have peace with God, have peace in our hearts, and have peace against the accusations of the devil and our conscience. When a war lord victoriously overcomes the enemy, peace follows after. So also, since Christ has overcome all His and our enemies in His victorious resurrection, He can thereafter wish [us] peace...Through Him, Samson's riddle was fulfilled: From the eater came something to eat and sweetness from the strong one...He is the powerful Lion from the stem of Judah, Rev 5:5, which mightily fought and overcame so that ours souls find honey-sweet food in Him."
Johann Gerhard, Eleven Easter and Pentecostal Sermons, Malone: Repristination Press, 1996, p. 52. Judges 14:14,18.

"Furthermore, another reason for stating that the Lamb of God was slain from the beginning of the world is that God the Lord, soon after the Fall in the beginning, made the promise that He wanted to have the Seed of the woman step on and crush the head of the hellish snake; and, it would also occur that the snake would bite the woman's Seed in the heel. This stinging of the heel is none other than that Devil's inflicting himself on the woman's Seed and bringing Him to the cross."
Johann Gerhard, Eleven Easter and Pentecostal Sermons, Malone: Repristination Press, 1996, p. 60. 1 Corinthians 5:7-8; Genesis 3:15.

"He who follows his feelings will perish, but he who clings to the Word with his heart will be delivered."
Sermons of Martin Luther, 8 vols., ed., John Nicholas Lenker, Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1983, II, p. 245. Mark 16:1-8.

"For when the heart clings to the Word, feelings and reasoning must fail."
Sermons of Martin Luther, 8 vols., ed., John Nicholas Lenker, Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1983, II, p. 246. Mark 16:1-8.

"Therefore the Holy Spirit must come to our rescue, not only to preach the Word to us, but also to enlarge and impel us from within, yea, even to employ the devil, the world and all kinds of afflictions and persecutions to this end. Just as a pig's bladder must be rubbed with salt and thoroughly worked to distend it, so this old hide of ours must be well salted and plagued until we call for help and cry aloud, and so stretch and expand ourselves, both through internal and through external suffering, that we may finally succeed and attain this heart and cheer, joy and consolation, from Christ's resurrection."
Sermons of Martin Luther, 8 vols., ed., John Nicholas Lenker, Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1983, II, p. 253. Mark 16:1-8.

"If I do not believe it, I will not receive its benefits; but that neither renders it false nor proves that anything is lacking in Christ."
Sermons of Martin Luther, 8 vols., ed., John Nicholas Lenker, Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1983, II, p. 258. Mark 16:1-8.

"For this reason one should not be too credulous when a preacher comes softly like an angel of God, recommends himself very highly, and swears that his sole aim is to save souls, and says: 'Pax vobis!' For those are the very fellows the devil employs to honey people's mouths. Through them he gains an entrance to preach and to teach, in order that he may afterward inflict his injuries, and that though he accomplish nothing more for the present, he may, at least, confound the people's consciences and finally lead them into misery and despair."
Sermons of Martin Luther, 8 vols., ed., John Nicholas Lenker, Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1983, II, p. 322. Luke 24:36-47.

"Thus we have two parts, preaching and believing. His coming to us is preaching; His standing in our hearts is faith. For it is not sufficient that He stand before our eyes and ears; He must stand in the midst of us in our hearts, and offer and impart to us peace."
Sermons of Martin Luther, 8 vols., xd., John Nicholas Lenker, Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1983, II, p. 355. John 20:19-31.

"The first and highest work of love a Christian ought to do when he has become a believer, is to bring others also to believe in the way he himself came to believe. And here you notice Christ begins and institutes the office of the ministry of the external Word in every Christian; for He Himself came with this office and the external Word."
Sermons of Martin Luther, 8 vols., ed., John Nicholas Lenker, Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1983, II, p. 359. John 20:19-31.

"Now God drives us to this by holding the law before us, in order that through the law we may come to a knowledge of ourselves. For where there is not this knowledge, one can never be saved. He that is well needs no physician; but if a man is sick and desires to become well, he must know that he is weak and sick, otherwise he cannot be helped."
Sermons of Martin Luther, 8 vols., ed., John Nicholas Lenker, Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1983, II, p. 370. John 20:19-31.

"Who are the people, therefore, to whom God makes known the resurrection of His Son? Women of little learning and poor fishermen."
Sermons of Martin Luther, The House Postils, 3 vols., ed., Eugene Klug, Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1996, II, p. 22. Luke 24:13-35.

Click on this link to get there:

Bethany Lutheran Worship

You will need broadband (cable or DSL) to get the service, plus speakers to hear the service. You will be watching it live on the Internet. We will make provisions for saving files and posting them on a website.

Double-click on the Bethany logo at the link to start the service. We start early to test some things. You will see the altar at that time.

You can use this link below to determine your local time compared to Phoenix, where we do not deal with the fraud of Daylight Savings Time:

Time Zone Comparisons

Easter Sunday's service will be Holy Communion at 8 AM Phoenix time.

Obamagic Gone

Mrs. Ichabod calls Barack Hussein Obama, "The Offender of the Faith." Recently, his supporters were miffed that some used Barack's middle name. He used it himself when announcing on TV how he would be a different kind of candidate.

Obama is really a Junior, named after his African father, who was a polygamist several times over. Senior was already married when he wed Junior's mother. He left his new wife and child in Hawaii to claim a scholarship at Harvard. Obama's white grandparents raised him and paid heavy-duty tuition to send him to an exclusive private high school (tuition about $14,000 a year now). The school has the fourth best sports program in the nation.

Obama also enjoyed the serenity of a multi-racial environment in Hawaii, where hardly anyone is one race or another. His prep school training got him to Columbia and Harvard, where his now-invisible wife Michelle served as his mentor. She already had a law degree.

I can understand Norm Teigen's remarks to some degree, based on his military experience. I just finished a book on the Black Panther tanks in WWII. The Black tankmen were treated like dirt during training and ignored while accomplishing incredible exploits for Patton in Europe. They fought for each other and they fought for respect. No one from that unit was given a Medal of Honor until decades later. They did not get a special citation for their unit until 50 years later.

In my home, Moline, Illinois, Blacks were not served at the family restaurant, the Hasty Tasty. (Please, no Moline comments. We thought a seven-course meal was a six-pack and a large bag of Fritos.) Blacks could sit down in the dining room, but no waitress would wait on them. We were in the North. We often discussed how the South was bigoted. The North was not. My father, in contrast, always served Blacks. It was never an issue at his business.

Here is the difference, where I part with Teigen: Barack's suddenly-retired pastor is a racial bigot in the pulpit, a Marxist in theology. I certainly understand the old rage, which was often justified in the past. I do not understand a U. S. Senator listening to a well-fed minister saying, "God _____ America." Oprah Winfrey, who is hardly a conservative, even less an orthodox Christian, quit that congregation two years ago because she could not tolerate the message.

Obama made matters worse with a moral equivalency logical fallacy. His grandmother "a typical white person" was no different from Rev. Wright when she expressed horror at being given a rough time by a Black panhandler. As far as I know, the grandmother who put him through private school did not mount a pulpit and attack people based on their race.

President Reagan did more for Blacks than any other president. He did that by transforming the economy with lower taxes, increasing the incentives for workers and small business owners. The Left would rather subjugate Blacks and Mexicans with socialistic programs which increase dependency without providing any solutions.

As I wrote before, we have three unpleasant alternatives for president so far, no real choice in agenda. The current fracas in the Democrat ranks will alienate one side or another. McCain will beat either one because of defections and sit-at-homes.

This election does depend very much on religion. Hillary was converted to social activism by her Methodist pastor. He sent her the Leftist Methodist social action magazine. She said once that she kept every single one of them.

Left-wing mainline activism stems from the Social Gospel Movement, which took root in the Federal Council of Churches. The FCC became so Communist that they changed the name to the National Council of Churches. Magic is defined as misdirection of the eye. "Oh no. The FCC does not exist anymore. We closed it down." That sounds like: "Church and Change. No that is gone. We closed it down."

One sure sign of apostasy is political activism replacing the Gospel while calling it The Gospel.

Good Friday Sermon

KJV Isaiah 52:12 For ye shall not go out with haste, nor go by flight: for the LORD will go before you; and the God of Israel will be your rereward. 13 Behold, my servant shall deal prudently, he shall be exalted and extolled, and be very high. 14 As many were astonied at thee; his visage was so marred more than any man, and his form more than the sons of men: 15 So shall he sprinkle many nations; the kings shall shut their mouths at him: for that which had not been told them shall they see; and that which they had not heard shall they consider. 53:1 Who hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the LORD revealed? 2 For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him. 3 He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. 4 Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. 5 But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. 6 All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. 7 He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth. 8 He was taken from prison and from judgment: and who shall declare his generation? for he was cut off out of the land of the living: for the transgression of my people was he stricken. 9 And he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death; because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth. 10 Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him; he hath put him to grief: when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in his hand. 11 He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities. 12 Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul unto death: and he was numbered with the transgressors; and he bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.

KJV John 19:1 Then Pilate therefore took Jesus, and scourged him. 2 And the soldiers platted a crown of thorns, and put it on his head, and they put on him a purple robe, 3 And said, Hail, King of the Jews! and they smote him with their hands. 4 Pilate therefore went forth again, and saith unto them, Behold, I bring him forth to you, that ye may know that I find no fault in him. 5 Then came Jesus forth, wearing the crown of thorns, and the purple robe. And Pilate saith unto them, Behold the man! 6 When the chief priests therefore and officers saw him, they cried out, saying, Crucify him, crucify him. Pilate saith unto them, Take ye him, and crucify him: for I find no fault in him. 7 The Jews answered him, We have a law, and by our law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God. 8 When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he was the more afraid; 9 And went again into the judgment hall, and saith unto Jesus, Whence art thou? But Jesus gave him no answer. 10 Then saith Pilate unto him, Speakest thou not unto me? knowest thou not that I have power to crucify thee, and have power to release thee? 11 Jesus answered, Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above: therefore he that delivered me unto thee hath the greater sin. 12 And from thenceforth Pilate sought to release him: but the Jews cried out, saying, If thou let this man go, thou art not Caesar's friend: whosoever maketh himself a king speaketh against Caesar. 13 When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he brought Jesus forth, and sat down in the judgment seat in a place that is called the Pavement, but in the Hebrew, Gabbatha. 14 And it was the preparation of the passover, and about the sixth hour: and he saith unto the Jews, Behold your King! 15 But they cried out, Away with him, away with him, crucify him. Pilate saith unto them, Shall I crucify your King? The chief priests answered, We have no king but Caesar. 16 Then delivered he him therefore unto them to be crucified. And they took Jesus, and led him away. 17 And he bearing his cross went forth into a place called the place of a skull, which is called in the Hebrew Golgotha: 18 Where they crucified him, and two other with him, on either side one, and Jesus in the midst. 19 And Pilate wrote a title, and put it on the cross. And the writing was, JESUS OF NAZARETH THE KING OF THE JEWS. 20 This title then read many of the Jews: for the place where Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city: and it was written in Hebrew, and Greek, and Latin. 21 Then said the chief priests of the Jews to Pilate, Write not, The King of the Jews; but that he said, I am King of the Jews. 22 Pilate answered, What I have written I have written. 23 Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took his garments, and made four parts, to every soldier a part; and also his coat: now the coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout. 24 They said therefore among themselves, Let us not rend it, but cast lots for it, whose it shall be: that the scripture might be fulfilled, which saith, They parted my raiment among them, and for my vesture they did cast lots. These things therefore the soldiers did. 25 Now there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother, and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalene. 26 When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple standing by, whom he loved, he saith unto his mother, Woman, behold thy son! 27 Then saith he to the disciple, Behold thy mother! And from that hour that disciple took her unto his own home. 28 After this, Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the scripture might be fulfilled, saith, I thirst. 29 Now there was set a vessel full of vinegar: and they filled a spunge with vinegar, and put it upon hyssop, and put it to his mouth. 30 When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished: and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost. 31 The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day, (for that sabbath day was an high day,) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away. 32 Then came the soldiers, and brake the legs of the first, and of the other which was crucified with him. 33 But when they came to Jesus, and saw that he was dead already, they brake not his legs: 34 But one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there out blood and water. 35 And he that saw it bare record, and his record is true: and he knoweth that he saith true, that ye might believe. 36 For these things were done, that the scripture should be fulfilled, A bone of him shall not be broken. 37 And again another scripture saith, They shall look on him whom they pierced.

NIV John 19:1 Then Pilate took Jesus and had him flogged. 2 The soldiers twisted together a crown of thorns and put it on his head. They clothed him in a purple robe 3 and went up to him again and again, saying, "Hail, king of the Jews!" And they struck him in the face. 4 Once more Pilate came out and said to the Jews, "Look, I am bringing him out to you to let you know that I find no basis for a charge against him." 5 When Jesus came out wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe, Pilate said to them, "Here is the man!" 6 As soon as the chief priests and their officials saw him, they shouted, "Crucify! Crucify!" But Pilate answered, "You take him and crucify him. As for me, I find no basis for a charge against him." 7 The Jews insisted, "We have a law, and according to that law he must die, because he claimed to be the Son of God." 8 When Pilate heard this, he was even more afraid, 9 and he went back inside the palace. "Where do you come from?" he asked Jesus, but Jesus gave him no answer. 10 "Do you refuse to speak to me?" Pilate said. "Don't you realize I have power either to free you or to crucify you?" 11 Jesus answered, "You would have no power over me if it were not given to you from above. Therefore the one who handed me over to you is guilty of a greater sin." 12 From then on, Pilate tried to set Jesus free, but the Jews kept shouting, "If you let this man go, you are no friend of Caesar. Anyone who claims to be a king opposes Caesar." 13 When Pilate heard this, he brought Jesus out and sat down on the judge's seat at a place known as the Stone Pavement (which in Aramaic is Gabbatha). 14 It was the day of Preparation of Passover Week, about the sixth hour. "Here is your king," Pilate said to the Jews. 15 But they shouted, "Take him away! Take him away! Crucify him!" "Shall I crucify your king?" Pilate asked. "We have no king but Caesar," the chief priests answered. 16 Finally Pilate handed him over to them to be crucified. So the soldiers took charge of Jesus. 17 Carrying his own cross, he went out to the place of the Skull (which in Aramaic is called Golgotha). 18 Here they crucified him, and with him two others-- one on each side and Jesus in the middle. 19 Pilate had a notice prepared and fastened to the cross. It read: JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS. 20 Many of the Jews read this sign, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city, and the sign was written in Aramaic, Latin and Greek. 21 The chief priests of the Jews protested to Pilate, "Do not write 'The King of the Jews,' but that this man claimed to be king of the Jews." 22 Pilate answered, "What I have written, I have written." 23 When the soldiers crucified Jesus, they took his clothes, dividing them into four shares, one for each of them, with the undergarment remaining. This garment was seamless, woven in one piece from top to bottom. 24 "Let's not tear it," they said to one another. "Let's decide by lot who will get it." This happened that the scripture might be fulfilled which said, "They divided my garments among them and cast lots for my clothing." So this is what the soldiers did. 25 Near the cross of Jesus stood his mother, his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. 26 When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother, "Dear woman, here is your son," 27 and to the disciple, "Here is your mother." From that time on, this disciple took her into his home. 28 Later, knowing that all was now completed, and so that the Scripture would be fulfilled, Jesus said, "I am thirsty." 29 A jar of wine vinegar was there, so they soaked a sponge in it, put the sponge on a stalk of the hyssop plant, and lifted it to Jesus' lips. 30 When he had received the drink, Jesus said, "It is finished." With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit. 31 Now it was the day of Preparation, and the next day was to be a special Sabbath. Because the Jews did not want the bodies left on the crosses during the Sabbath, they asked Pilate to have the legs broken and the bodies taken down. 32 The soldiers therefore came and broke the legs of the first man who had been crucified with Jesus, and then those of the other. 33 But when they came to Jesus and found that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. 34 Instead, one of the soldiers pierced Jesus' side with a spear, bringing a sudden flow of blood and water. 35 The man who saw it has given testimony, and his testimony is true. He knows that he tells the truth, and he testifies so that you also may believe. 36 These things happened so that the scripture would be fulfilled: "Not one of his bones will be broken," 37 and, as another scripture says, "They will look on the one they have pierced."

Good Friday


Hymn #174
The Invocation p. 5
The Confession of Sins
The Absolution
The Introit p. 6
The Gloria Patri
The Kyrie p. 7
The Gloria in Excelsis
The Salutation and Collect p. 9
The Epistle and Gradual Isaiah 52:12ff.
The Gospel John 19:1ff.
Glory be to Thee, O Lord!
Praise be to Thee, O Christ!
The Apostles Creed p. 12
Sermon Hymn #172
The Sermon
The Little Gospel
The Votum
The Offertory p. 12
The Prayers and Lord's Prayer p. 13
The Benediction p. 14
The Closing Hymn #52

KJV Isaiah 53:1 Who hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the LORD revealed? 2 For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him. 3 He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. 4 Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. 5 But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.

UPON THE CROSS

People confused about justification by faith write, “What happened on Good Friday?” They fail to see the difference between the sacrificial act of Christ and the proclamation of that act. Jesus died on the cross for the sins of the world, for you and for me. That is the Gospel message. The proclamation of the Gospel message is a work of the Holy Spirit, declaring to all those who believe in Christ that their sins are taken away.

Every child knows the meaning of this Old Testament prophesy. It was written centuries before Christ was born. Imagine someone from King Arthur’s Court predicting what would happen today. That is how distant this prophesy was (not in exact years), so far back in time that one can hardly imagine so many years. And yet, these verses, in fact the entire chapter is a vivid portrayal of the crucifixion of Christ.

Paul uses this verse in Romans 10, teaching us that faith comes by hearing. To be more accurate, he is saying that faith comes by preaching. It is not the act of hearing itself that brings about faith but the Holy Spirit working through the spoken Word of God. Faith comes by sermons, we might say. Who has believed our sermon?

KJV Romans 10:16 But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Esaias saith, Lord, who hath believed our report? 17 So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.

God’s love for His people was so great that He began preaching the Gospel to us when Adam and Eve were expelled from the garden (Genesis 3:15). If Isaiah was early, think how ancient those words are that we remember tonight. God said to the serpent, “You will bruise his heel, but He will crush your head.”

From the beginning God placed faith in the hearts of people through the spoken Word. Most of the time He entrusted this Word to prophets. Christ appointed apostles who then trained pastors to serve under them. I know one person who does not accept any sermon as the Word of God. He said he can only be taught by direct quotation of Scripture. But Jesus said, “Whoever hears you hears Me.”

KJV Luke 10:16 He that heareth you heareth me; and he that despiseth you despiseth me; and he that despiseth me despiseth him that sent me.

Some people did not even pay attention to Jesus, who taught them:

KJV John 5:24 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life

So we are inclined to say, “Who is this, a mere man, to tell us what God thinks and says?” But that is exactly what pastors have been called by God (through the congregation) to do. In the same way the head of the household is placed in that role to teach his family the Word of God. True, many men despise this role and reject it. But it is still God’s decision and appointment, God’s Creation and order. Those who acknowledge this as good and wise will benefit from it.

Faith grows from hearing the Gospel promises. The last two verses in this section are especially noteworthy in a remarkable chapter:

4 Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. 5 But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.

Verse 4 tells us how terrible the crucifixion would be. Verse 5 teaches us what the crucifixion means. It would have a purpose. The Son of Man would be wounded to pay for our sins, beaten for our evil. His whipping would be to give us peace through the forgiveness of sins. “By His stripes we are healed.”

For those who believe in Jesus, and this comes only through the work of the Holy Spirit in the Word, these words are a great comfort. We already know this, but in hearing it again our faith is deepened.

Luther has two very good points to make about the crucifixion. One is that we should never dwell upon the cross in this way, saying, “Look at what those Jews and Romans did to the perfect Son of God!” That is all wrong and contrary to this lesson. Instead we should say when we meditate on the cross, “Look at what I did to Jesus. Those are my sins that He bore. I was the transgressor and He was whipped. I rebelled against God’s Law and He was humiliated and mocked. I am the cause of His suffering.” Otherwise, although the Romans and the Jewish leaders played a role, we miss the whole concept of His atoning death. If Jesus died because of THEIR sins and not because of MY sins, then I am not expressing faith in the cross.

Secondly, Luther correctly taught that the surest form of sorrow for sin is not weeping, or feeling bad, or outward and emotional signs of repentance. No, the surest sign of genuine repentance (a work of the Holy Spirit and not from our own efforts) is when we are forgiving toward others. Whenever we stew about wrongs committed against us, and many of these things do happen, since we do them to others as well, then we are saying, “I would like to enjoy complete and free forgiveness of my sins, but I will not give an ounce of mercy to anyone else.” That is a failure to grasp the meaning of forgiveness, a failure to be thankful for forgiveness.

Why did Jesus die on the cross? He was tortured to give us peace, not agitation. The first step is taking away our sins through His atoning death. God says, “Here is a great Treasure, an infinite source of forgiveness, the cross of My beloved Son, where He poured out His blood for your sins.” The more God teaches us this great truth, the more we trust it and grasp it as the greatest and most life-giving truth on earth. Through this trust in our hearts created by the Word God grants us forgiveness. God says, “You must do one thing absolutely to receive the forgiveness of sins. You must believe the Gospel of forgiveness.” In believing and holding on to this truth, we receive the what the promise offers.

In practicing this forgiveness we enjoy a double blessing. It is far better to be forgiving than to be full of revenge. (Unfortunately, it is also much more difficult, but it gets easier with practice.) And in addition—this is the second blessing—the person forgiven also enjoys this peace of God. Revenge and bitterness are doubly difficult on people, both in giving and receiving. It is very contagious. I knew one family where the youngest child was a blond angel. She was very sunny all the time. Not one day. I was at their home when she stormed in and whacked her older sister for some slight on the way home from school. It’s hard to sort out. One child said eloquently, “He hit me back first.” Somebody started something and it gets escalated. It spirals out of control, as we see all the time on the news. For those of us who care nothing for soccer – why would anyone riot at a soccer match?

To enjoy this blessing of forgiveness, we have to dwell on the meaning of the cross of Christ rather than whatever annoys us at the moment. I don’t mean to minimize this, because some people have really been the victims of various kinds of assault and robbery. I knew a woman who was beaten almost to death for a few dollars in the cash register. However, when we think about the immensity of God’s forgiveness of all of our sins, then we can be more expansive in forgiving others. We can do that for two reasons. One is that forgiveness is not wasted. If someone is forgiven and yet goes on doing more bad things, then God will add up the totals later. God is just and will be not be mocked. Secondly we can be forgiving because we need to be in that pattern of behavior, which belongs to Christ, rather than following the unbelieving world in exacting revenge.

The first place to begin practicing this forgiveness earned for us by Christ is within our own homes. That is where the greatest and most important conflicts arise. When we apply this lesson of forgiveness, we enjoy the benefits and see its blessings in our children, who also have the peace that passes understanding from this message of the Gospel.

Link to Live Worship Service, Good Friday, 1 PM Phoenix Time.

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Eagle Eye has left a new comment on your post "Good Friday Sermon":

Glad I could witness your first Internet Divine Service..Pleasingly humble. Ditto Jackson's demeanour. Prayed for whoever it was of the 17 who dropped out (Maybe they expected something grand) The simplicity of it all impressed me; because it was NOT grand. God is to be thanked that Jackson is willing to make Bethany's Divine Services available in this way, as your enemies are bound to cast jibes and sarcasm before long. That must be expected. Rejoicing that the pure Gospel is being made available from "Moscow to Manhattan for stranded Lutherans" - as one laymen who got this going said a while back on Ichabod.

Thanking God for the laymen who suggested this, and helped get it on the road.

The humble efforts of you all be mightily blessed of Almighty God (the Father, Son, & Holy Spirit), to the salvation of souls.

In Christ's name, AMEN.

Apologies am "Anonymous" for now. Looking forward to your Div. Serv. on Easter Sunday.

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GJ - Apparently Eagle Eye is a blogger. That is all I know. I have no problems with anonymous, edifying posts, as long as each Anonymous has a distinctive and consistent name.

Sad for the Wrong Reasons

Woe. Woe. Thrice woe.

One ELS pastor posted his sadness over the new ELCA report. He is sad for the wrong reasons. Let ELCA be ELCA, following The Episcopal Church down the rathole of apostasy. Anyone with a little common sense and no Biblical training can detect the mountains of self-righteous excrement in the ELCA report. The posturing and presumption show that ELCA no longer has the horsepower to argue a bad case well.

A better question for the ELS is - Why are you still in bed with ELCA?

"Oh no!" they cry out ovinely. "We are not in fellowship with ELCA."

No?

They have been working with ELCA for decades now through WELS. I am not sure how many planning events and actual sessions they sit down at. The ELS is not eager to share with me or with its own members and clergy. However, there is a clear pattern of WELS (We cherish our fellowship with the ELS) working with ELCA on a host of union projects. Has the new WELS SP stopped this? That is not likely. Has Pope John the Malefactor taken WELS to the woodshed over this? No reports have emerged.

The funding agency for union with ELCA and Missouri is Thrivent, the merger of LB and AAL. They used to compete in throwing dollars at pan-Lutheran activities. They joined forces some years ago.

The magazines and PR releases used to brag about WELS working with Missouri and ELCA. Many reports were copied into Christian News and the news flow stopped. No one said the money stopped. No one said the unionism stopped.

In fact, James P. Tiefel (nicknamed Teufel by his associates) had his own ecumenical worship events. Perhaps insurance money greased the wheels of unionism for him, too. The first one included every faith group (Roman Catholic, ELCA, Missouri, Evangelical) except the ELS.

If ELCA is so bad, then why work so closely with apostates?

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Joe Abrahamson has left a new comment on your post "Sad for the Wrong Reasons":

Greg,
It's ok to put the url of my post up if you want.

http://diatheke.blogspot.com

Sincere thanks for the criticism.

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GJ - I have known Joe for a long time. I was not picking on him, but on the general trend to say, "Look how bad ELCA is." Obviously WELS is on the same track as ELCA, as I have tirelessly pointed out for decades now. Proof is how people easily accept today what would have been career-ending a few years ago.

I will compare Bivens' fatuous advice to ELCA's fatuous report if I have time, energy, and enough coffee.