My title is from a statement by Luther - so many purchase Hell by their works when they can have Heaven for free.
I was debating these matters by IM on Facebook last night. I seem to have a lot of conversations that way, often very late. They tear me away, reluctantly, from grading student papers.
Hygienic doctrine (aka sound doctrine - look at the Greek) teaches us how God does everything through the Means of Grace. I found a little piece by Prof John Brenner, published in FICKLE, on that topic. I did not swoon, because I saw no antitheses. If Sparky really believed what he wrote, he would have added: "So why are we promoting Reformed and New Age doctrine at this school and around the synod?"
Satan wants the sheep fed, fat and tender, but not warned.
All false doctrine devolves into a system of works, which is our default belief system. That is why works-religion is so popular and works-salesmen attract crowds. The Gospel is thinly sown. When people have their self-justification taken away by preaching the Means of Grace, they are just as furious as the Pharisees who trusting in their own righteousness. No longer does it matter than someone is fifth generation WELS--or, as they said in Byzantium--born to the purple. No longer does the acreage of the parking lot matter.
He got a grant? God grant him spiritual wisdom instead.
When Lutherans teach works religion--via their heroes Hybels, Warren, Sweet, Groeschel--they touch the hearts of the audiences, by hardening them even more. The works-preachers harden their own hearts too. A few decades of this sick doctrine and an entire synod is destroyed while the vultures feast on the bones. No discernment is left. No one has the will to stop the cackling carrion birds.
Luther is inexpensive. Luther is free. I would rather spend the rest of my life reading Luther than crack open a book from the latest works salesman.
