ELCA, Episcopal Church Mark 10th Anniversary of Full Communion - News Releases - Evangelical Lutheran Church in America

"I'll be seeing you
in all the old familiar courtrooms..."
The Episcopal Bishop is busy suing her own congregations.
Likewise, the ELCA Bishop is threatening his own sheep and shepherds.
They have found doctrinal agreement, and it is sweet indeed.



ELCA, Episcopal Church Mark 10th Anniversary of Full Communion - News Releases - Evangelical Lutheran Church in America

ELCA NEWS SERVICE
January 7, 2011
ELCA, Episcopal Church Mark 10th Anniversary of Full Communion


CHICAGO (ELCA) -- Ten years ago this week, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) and The Episcopal Church launched a relationship of shared mission and ministry in a worship service and ceremony at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C.

This relationship, known as full communion, is described in Called to Common Mission: A Lutheran Proposal for a Revision of the Concordat of Agreement adopted by both churches. The document states: "We do not know to what new, recovered, or continuing tasks of mission this Concordat will lead our churches, but we give thanks to God for leading us to this point. We entrust ourselves to that leading in the future, confident that our full communion will be a witness to the gift and goal already present in Christ, 'so that God may be all in all' (I Corinthians 15:28)."
Two churches are considered to be in full communion when they "develop a relationship based on a common confessing of the Christian faith, and a mutual recognition of baptism and sharing of the Lord's Supper," according to information on the ELCA website. Full communion is not a merger of the churches, but an agreement in which the churches pledge to celebrate commonalities and respect differences. They engage in joint worship, may exchange clergy, and share a commitment to evangelism, witness and service in the world.

ELCA congregations and Episcopal parishes will mark the anniversary through special joint worship services. Many Lutherans will use prayer resources available on at http://ow.ly/3yOlQ on the ELCA website.

"As we observe the 10th Anniversary of Called to Common Mission, we are able to celebrate the shared mission and shared ministries that have enriched our church bodies," said the Rev. Donald J. McCoid, executive for ELCA Ecumenical and Inter-Religious Relations. "From shared local ministries and shared ordained clergy to campus ministries, disaster relief, ministry education, global mission training, advocacy work, and many daily ministries in and with our full communion partners, we give thanks to God for the many ways that (the agreement) has blessed our churches."

Called to Common Mission acknowledges that the focus of the full communion agreement is on "shared mission," McCoid said.

"As we look to the future, we see the seeds of closer cooperation being sown through mutual mission assessment and planning. We have grown in understanding the traditions and structures of one another. We continue to see the importance of making our commitment to the common mission that our Lord Jesus has given to us," he added.

In August 1999, the ELCA Churchwide Assembly adopted Called to Common Mission, followed by the Episcopal Church General Convention in July 2000. Both meetings took place in Denver.

2 Epiphany pastors resign; one forms a new ministry

Be happy or be ...


2 Epiphany pastors resign; one forms a new ministry

By Jill Kelley, Staff WriterUpdated 11:57 PM Thursday, January 6, 2011

CENTERVILLE — Two Epiphany Lutheran Church pastors, citing a division between their core values and the direction of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, resigned this week, and one has started a new ministry.

Senior Pastor John Bradosky has accepted the job of general secretary of the breakaway North American Lutheran Church. Meanwhile, Associate Pastor Todd Kornahrens has started a new ministry in Centerville, the Living Water Lutheran Church.

Living Water will hold its first service at 10:15 a.m. Sunday at Weller Elementary School. It plans to open at 175 E. Franklin St. in February, when that facility is ready.

Kornahrens will be the lead pastor, and the church’s management team is primarily made up of former Epiphany members. Living Water is applying to be recognized as the first NALC congregation in the Dayton area.

The NALC, a more traditionally focused Lutheran denomination, was formed in the wake of the ELCA’s 2009 social statement and policy changes that included the decision to accept noncelibate gay ministers.

The statement proved controversial for many within the Lutheran church who saw it as indicative of the difference of opinion within the ELCA about how Scripture should be interpreted.

Robert Preus Changed

Brett Meyer has left a new comment on your post "Knapp's Double-Justification Has Consequences.":

Robert Preus was kind enough to emphatically disclose that Universal Objective Justification is not synonymous with the Atonement.

"Objective justification which is God’s verdict of acquittal over the whole world is not identical with the atonement, it is not another way of expressing the fact that Christ has redeemed the world. Rather it is based upon the substitutionary work of Christ, or better, it is a part of the atonement itself. It is God’s response to all that Christ died to save us, God’s verdict that Christ’s work is finished, that He has been indeed reconciled, propitiated; His anger has been stilled and He is at peace with the world, and therefore He has declared the entire world in Christ to be righteous."

http://www.reclaimingwalther.org/articles/jmc00225.htm

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From Luther vs. the UOJ Pietists:

Robert Preus, Justification and Rome

Dr. Robert Preus is known for advocating UOJ in the 1980s, when Concordia Seminary in Ft. Wayne was also deep into Church Growth Enthusiasm. In his last book, in spite of editing from his sons, his clear stances against UOJ is obvious.

But the imputation of Christ's righteousness to the sinner takes place when the Holy Spirit brings him to faith through Baptism and the Word of the Gospel. Our sins were imputed to Christ at His suffering and death, imputed objectively after He, by His active and passive obedience, fulfilled and procured all righteousness for us. But the imputation of His righteousness to us takes place when we are brought to faith.[1] 

The Enthusiasts often mention Calov as their champion, knowing that almost no one has access to Calov’s books. Preus, who knew this period of Lutheran orthodoxy quite well, quoted this statement from Calov with approval -

Although Christ has acquired for us the remission of sins, justification, and sonship, God just the same does not justify us prior to our faith. Nor do we become God's children in Christ in such a way that justification in the mind of God takes place before we believe.[2]

I understand these two passages to be a repudiation of UOJ and an apology for all the harm done in the name of that fad.

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[1] Robert D. Preus Justification and Rome, St. Louis: Concordia Academic Press 1997, p. 72.

[2] Apodixis Articulorum Fide, Lueneburg, 1684. Cited in Robert D. Preus Justification and Rome, St. Louis: Concordia Academic Press 1997, p. 131n.                                                                                                              

Concern for the Trucker

bruce-church (https://bruce-church.myopenid.com/) has left a new comment on your post "Fatal Car Crash":

Actually, these anonymous bloggers are all wrong. The concern should be more for the trucker than anyone else, who was made against his (or her) will to take the life of others and will have to deal with it. I doubt anyone in the WELS will be sending him or her money for counselling sessions:

East 46th Street and Portland Avenue South:

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=East+46th+Street+and+Portland+Avenue+South,+minneapolis,+mn&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hq=&hnear=Portland+Ave+S+%26+E+46th+St,+Minneapolis,+MN+55407&gl=us&ei=w9ImTe2LH4rfnQe8nPXUAQ&sa=X&oi=geocode_result&ct=image&resnum=1&ved=0CBQQ8gEwAA

 
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GJ - One program on TV discussed the devastating impact on railroad engineers when their trains strike and kill passengers in a car. As I recall, one almost ran over a baby because the mother took a flimsy buggy across multiple tracks and got it stuck. The mother stood there working on the wheels instead of taking the baby away. A man rescued them both at the last minute. The engineer did not hurt anyone, but he collapsed when the train stopped and he left the cab.

Similarly, I saw a car slowly drive across tracks when a train was coming, the lights were on, and the engineer was blowing his horn. Once the car was clear, for no apparent reason, the driver slowly crossed the tracks again, just missing a fatal accident.

The truck driver will have to live with two fatalities. The facts revealed so far state that Pastor Voss ran the red light.

Knapp's Double-Justification Has Consequences.

Schleiermacher is a good example of emphasizing universal absolution by itself, as Karl Barth did.

bruce-church (https://bruce-church.myopenid.com/) has left a new comment on your post "On the Notorious Iver Johnson - Editor of WELS' Ch...":

People ask, like Norm did in the past, "What's the big deal over UOJ?" Others try to water it down and make it seem like the scriptural doctrine of Atonement. UOJ, however, leads to immorality and apostasy today just as it did in the case of the immorality of Bishop Stephan Martin and the apostasy of Professor Eduard Preuss in the 19th Century. Dr. Jackson is doing us the favor of documenting some of the damage done by UOJ, and restricts himself to public persons and material, and then only when those persons didn't get clean away with it. What could he reveal if he reported on the hidden mechanizations of the synod that works to ostracize and exile against any student or pastor or critic who is just a bit too moral for the WELS UOJers to tolerate? So that's part I of refuting UOJ, but Part II has barely begun. Rest assured that Dr. Jackson's new release won't be the last word on refuting UOJ, or that you've seen all the historical and doctrinal evidence against UOJ.