The Great Physician, by Norma Boeckler
My friend in Milwaukee tells me that the WELS congregations are remodeling their churches so the front is a stage.
One WELS teacher went back to his home parish and found the pastor wandering into the congregation and explaining the lesson to the congregation before reading the Scriptures.
Entertainment, snacks during the service, and other gimmicks are not exclusive to Ski and the WELS Fox Valley gang. Nor are they limited to WELS.
Lutherans of all synods once sought a semblance of unity by using the historic liturgy--the General Synod leaving their revivalism behind--and Lutheran hymns. They erred on the side of Methodist hymns, in my opinion, but all synods in the 1960s were using the historic liturgy, hymns, creeds, the appointed readings, and a real sermon.
Chaos reigns among the Lutherans in the 21st century. The denomination label means nothing, even if it can be found on the sign outside. The Sunday service might be liturgical, pop Babtist, or a blend: bi-sectsual. The bi-sectsual service is designed as a holding device until the venue can be 100% pop.
I detest the word venue for worship, but the Shrinkers use it. I can hardly use worship for the blasphemies uttered by these illiterates, so please assume I am using venue as an expression of disgust and derision.
People would like to attend Lutheran liturgical services where the Creed, hymns, the liturgy, and the sermon are not an embarrassment to the pastor. That seems to be too much to ask, because the momentum is clearly toward removing the Lutheran name, mocking Biblical doctrine, eliminating the liturgy, and treating the Creed as an obstacle to spiritual growth.
Robes - even Geneva gowns - are better for hiding the fat tummies the ministers. Few want to go to church and see a slob speaking up front, reminding all the men of what they look like with too many beers and pizzas in their diet.
Are we all idiots? Are people so stupid that they cannot understand the clear, plain Word of God? The ministers should not assume that the members are as dense as they are. After all, the members have not spent countless mind-numbing hours at Fuller seminars and Willow Creek re-education centers.
For example, almost all the UOJ fanatics are clergy or laity who dropped out of seminary training. Almost none of the laity are confused about justification by faith. When people hear the pure Word of God, without any reference to Lutherdom, they become orthodox believers.
Must Lutheran congregations, in the name of mission, hide the Sacraments? What folly is that - to be ashamed of the Visible Word when Holy Baptism and Holy Communion are the treasures of the Lutheran Church, of historic Christianity?
Needless to say, the sanctimonious unbelievers of UOJ have no use for the Sacraments, and their spineless enablers have nothing to say about it. Muttering quietly about this anti-Sacrament travesty--over a coffee and danish at conference--is not the equivalent of in statu confessionis.
When clergy-bots get trained in Fuller doctrine, they become Fuller-bots. All the conservative seminaries have done that for the last 30 years. ELCA has also leavened their clergy with CG fads and fallacies.
If the Wisconsin and Missouri sects stopped trusting in Daddy Warbucks, Thrivent, and foundations, they could cut loose the heretics and the useful idiots financing them. Oh noes! Oh panic! How can we replace those millions? I believe the members--even in this Obama Depression--would make up the difference and then some.
This is an ideal time for Schroeder (WELS) and Harrison (LCMS) to cut loose ELCA entirely. What better time to say:
1. We abhor your abortion on demand lobbying and health insurance practices.
2. We reject your newly invented rationale for homosexual, lesbian, bi-sexual, and transexual clergy.
3. We condemn your Unitarian doctrine cloaked in Roman high churchism.
What better time to:
1. End all involvement with Thrivent, from the free napkins and calendars to the pan-Lutheran Leftist grants.
2. Create an alternative to Lutheran World Relief.
3. Stop worshiping the Golden Calf and trust in the Means of Grace.
The Word can do this, but two generations of clergy have tasted the cotton candy and hanker for it night and day.
