ICHABOD, THE GLORY HAS DEPARTED - explores the Age of Apostasy, predicted in 2 Thessalonians 2:3, to attack Objective Faithless Justification, Church Growth Clowns, and their ringmasters. The antidote to these poisons is trusting the efficacious Word in the Means of Grace. John 16:8. Isaiah 55:8ff. Romans 10. Most readers are WELS, LCMS, ELS, or ELCA. This blog also covers the Roman Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodoxy, and the Left-wing, National Council of Churches denominations.
Saturday, June 25, 2011
Few Missouri Synod Officials Would Have Lowered Themselves To Stop by a Mere Stable
"Let us learn more and more to look upon the Lutheran Church with the right kind of spiritual eyes: it is the most beautiful and glorious Church; for it is adorned with God's pure Word. This adornment is so precious, that even though an orthodox congregation were to consist of very poor people - let us say nothing but woodchoppers - and met in a barn (as the Lord Christ also lay here on earth in a barn, on hay and straw), every Christian should much, much rather prefer to affiliate himself with this outwardly so insignificant congregation, rather than with a heterodox congregation, even if its members were all bank presidents and assembled in a church built of pure marble. Let us be sure that our flesh, and the talk of others does not darken the glory of the orthodox Church, or crowd it out of our sight."
Francis Pieper, The Difference between Orthodox and Heterodox Churches, and Supplement, Coos Bay, Oregon: St. Paul's Lutheran Church, 1981, p. 47.
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29A wrote:
I forgot that the Augsburg confession was given June 25. I knew it was in 1530.
It is quite evident from all the Lutheran confessors and the post-Lutherans of the 1600's that we are justified by faith. Melanchthon was was clear about that.
Paul McCain should join Joel Osteen's church seeing he is so big on size of building and numbers. He should really watch what he says about sects and cults. He belongs to one called the LCMS.
Have a blessed Sunday and we will remember that event that took place back in 1530.
Shakespeare (Oxford) said: "A Little Pot Is Soon Hot"
Phone us for free napkins, paper cups, calendars, and flower charts."
Paul T. McCain (Ptmccain) Member Username: Ptmccain Post Number: 111 Registered: 4-2009 |
I checked in again recently over at Ickybog, Greg Jackson's ranting forum. The guy who runs a congregation out of a bedroom in his house, consecrating elements over the Internet for his little cult really can't handle any kind of criticism. Which is ironic since he is consumed by hate and anger and blasts everyone/anyone in a manner that, frankly, would quality him for some kind of mental health ward. But it makes for some really entertaining reading. He makes LutherQueasy look positively docile. |
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GJ - If Paul obtained a humor transplant from an actuary, it would still be an improvement. Or he could consider what Missouri's Francis Pieper wrote:
"Let us learn more and more to look upon the Lutheran Church with the right kind of spiritual eyes: it is the most beautiful and glorious Church; for it is adorned with God's pure Word. This adornment is so precious, that even though an orthodox congregation were to consist of very poor people - let us say nothing but woodchoppers - and met in a barn (as the Lord Christ also lay here on earth in a barn, on hay and straw), every Christian should much, much rather prefer to affiliate himself with this outwardly so insignificant congregation, rather than with a heterodox congregation, even if its members were all bank presidents and assembled in a church built of pure marble. Let us be sure that our flesh, and the talk of others does not darken the glory of the orthodox Church, or crowd it out of our sight."
Francis Pieper, The Difference between Orthodox and Heterodox Churches, and Supplement, Coos Bay, Oregon: St. Paul's Lutheran Church, 1981, p. 47.
Church GROWTH, CHURCH Growth,
And
CHURCH GROWTH!!!
I talked to Hunter on his way into the Purple Palace to met with the bosses.
Pope Paul Without a Call defended Barry's weakness on CG.
The LCMC (more like the ALC) now has 700+ congregations.
The NALC (more like the LCA, aka the Retired ELCA Bishops' Synod) has 200 congregations already.
Other congregations have formed around the LMS-USA, the AALC, and some other entities.
ELCA Bishop Mark Hanson has created around 1,000 congregations so far, mostly by forcing their exit from Whorely Mother Synod.
I recall Doctrinal Pussycat Robert Mueller saying, "We are not for Church GROWTH. We are for CHURCH growth." That was a Kelmism, I am sure.
Cause for Alarm: Lutheran Church
Sinking into the Bog of Cultural Decline,
Moral Indifference, Doctrinal Apostasy
KJV Joel 1:1 The word of the LORD that came to Joel the son of Pethuel. 2 Hear this, ye old men, and give ear, all ye inhabitants of the land. Hath this been in your days, or even in the days of your fathers? 3 Tell ye your children of it, and let your children tell their children, and their children another generation. 4 That which the palmerworm hath left hath the locust eaten; and that which the locust hath left hath the cankerworm eaten; and that which the cankerworm hath left hath the caterpiller eaten. 5 Awake, ye drunkards, and weep; and howl, all ye drinkers of wine, because of the new wine; for it is cut off from your mouth. 6 For a nation is come up upon my land, strong, and without number, whose teeth are the teeth of a lion, and he hath the cheek teeth of a great lion. 7 He hath laid my vine waste, and barked my fig tree: he hath made it clean bare, and cast it away; the branches thereof are made white. 8 Lament like a virgin girded with sackcloth for the husband of her youth. 9 The meat offering and the drink offering is cut off from the house of the LORD; the priests, the LORD'S ministers, mourn. 10 The field is wasted, the land mourneth; for the corn is wasted: the new wine is dried up, the oil languisheth. 11 Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen; howl, O ye vinedressers, for the wheat and for the barley; because the harvest of the field is perished. 12 The vine is dried up, and the fig tree languisheth; the pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even all the trees of the field, are withered: because joy is withered away from the sons of men. 13 Gird yourselves, and lament, ye priests: howl, ye ministers of the altar: come, lie all night in sackcloth, ye ministers of my God: for the meat offering and the drink offering is withholden from the house of your God. 14 Sanctify ye a fast, call a solemn assembly, gather the elders and all the inhabitants of the land into the house of the LORD your God, and cry unto the LORD, 15 Alas for the day! for the day of the LORD is at hand, and as a destruction from the Almighty shall it come.
One reader sent some information that easily escaped me, since I dislike most modern music. A misfit by the name of Cee Lo Green has a song out with an obscene title, and that video has 57 million hits on YouTube. I checked out the facts and verified the figures.
The Little Three of the Syn Conference participate eagerly in this decline. I was thinking about reasons why matters continue to get much worse. Here are some samples:
- Someone in the Missouri Synod decided to post a video mocking the liturgy, filming it at the church, near the altar.
- For reasons unknown, a WELS pastor videotaped himself gyrating to "Elephant Dance" in his robe, at the altar. He posted it to the congregation's website, also for reasons unknown.
- In the name of Emergent Church, various parishes in the Little Three provide mediocre copies of entertainment services, and the leaders defend this. That is really the bigger or worse mockery. The first two examples were taken down. The routine mockery continues and grows.
- Four decades ago, the main difference between a Missouri service and an LCA service in my hometown was the musical setting of the liturgy. Everything else was the same and the sermons were often similar: Biblical and original. The LCA said they practiced open communion, but in reality communion was 99.9% members only.
Congregations have forgotten that they can call anyone from within their own sect, so they do not have to beg the District Pope for candidates, nor do they have to accept the alcoholics and adulterers who are passed around, to use and abuse again. The hyper-congregationalism that allows Easter bunny ads and rock music services can also be used to reject the same and operate outside of Changer/CGM dictates.
Chemnitz Lutheran Church could say, "We dropped your CG hymnal and feminazi creeds. We opposed your failing fads, so we are taking in members from all over. Deal with it." The division of the synods should not be along historical or quasi-political lines, but based on money and property alone. The apostates should get all the Schwan and Thrivent money, all the property, and the Changers installed in lifetime positions. I forgot. They are already installed in lifetime positions.
The orthodox Lutherans could be thrust into the world with nothing but the Word and the Confessions, unencumbered by the alleged dictates of the money grants. The bureaucracy sets up those grants to force them to do what they want to do anyway, so they can claim they had to bed down with ELCA or overlook a little matter like abortion in the denomination's health plan. Confidential to Baby Blue Eyes: each sect has gay clergy, so no one is bothered by ELCA. Any bureaucracy is going to end up like Hollywood, full of misfits and addicts and unemployable relatives. Boss A overlooks the DUI conviction so that Boss B overlooks his arrest in the park - one big, happy family. The Little Three are full of divorced and remarried clergy, too. "Bless be the tie that binds our hearts in secrets hid." Just asking about it will get a put-down normally reserved for a certain blogger.
The Boomer clergy, especially the younger Boomers (born 1946 - 1964) will have the ultimate punishment meted out. They will get to see the results of their cowardly conformity visited upon everything they know. They will see membership vanish, congregations and schools closed, and increasing harshness from the insecure popes. Their children will pay a fortune for their denomination's education, borrowing tons of money, but they will not have jobs in the sect. The big Emergent success stories will happen, here and there, boosted by the unique chemistry of the senior apostate. If the congregation does not pop like a bubble, it will go into future iterations as a generic Protestant church and finally as a Unitarian outpost. Robert Schuller has done all that in his one, famous church in Garden Grove. So yes, Boomer conformists, Your Church Has Real Possibilities too.
PS - DP Buchholz said the biggest problem in WELS was with the Boomer leaders, but how is he different, with Changer Jeff Gunn in the same metro area? The only discipline visited upon Gunn is his election to the board of directors of Willowcreek's Little College in Milwaukee, along with the new president coming from CrossWalk, and another board member coming from CrossWalk. Gunn was shopping for a job at WLC. SPindoktor Schroeder put his foot down, so Paul Calvin Kelm got the invented job.
Friday, June 24, 2011
Unposed Emmaus Photo Revealed
"You get 50 to 60 million bucks a year for selling Thrivent insurance?"
Matt Harrison, "Yes, we do. Peddling insurance is good for our synod!"
"Then how much is ELCA making on the deal?"
"$100 million, easily."
Pope John the Malefactor, "All we get are free napkins."
SP Schroeder, "You need to join the Salvation Army, John. Hahahaha."
Matt Harrison, "Or join Habitat for Humanity. Build some houses. Har."
Our Top Secret Contact - 29A - Offers This Assessment
I like the picture of the synod of the planet of the apes.
The NIV, the Kuske catechism, and finally CW has sent WELS into the apostate crowd. Whether they believe that or not.
29a
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GJ - They sold CW as attracting the younger crowd. But the same Shrinkers were busy dumping their new hymnal, the organ, the liturgy, the creeds, and original sermons. The way to succeed, they imagined, was to ape and to plagiarize their heroes - Leonard Sweet, Craig Groeschel, Andy Stanley, and worse.
Another New Dogma from the Syn Conference:
The Immaculate Reception
"It should perhaps be mentioned also that some of our Lutheran teachers limited the real presence to the moment of eating and drinking. This, too, goes beyond the specific words of Christ."
Review of Bjarne Wollan Teigen, TheLord's Supper in the Theology of Martin Chemnitz, W. Gawrisch, Wisconsin Lutheran Quarterly, Spring, 1987, 84, p. 155.
Those who support UOJ have also crawled into bed with Receptionism, whether they admit it or not. If the hand of the communicant--instead of the powerful and efficacious Word--can effect the miraculous change in the earthly elements of Holy Communion, then God can declare the entire world forgiven without the Word, without the Means of Grace.
At least Sig Becker, Mequon, was a consistent Enthusiast. He divorced the Holy Spirit from the Word in UOJ and in Receptionism.
I heard various Syn Conference leaders saying, "We do not know the exact moment of consecration." I had to agree with them. They did not know the moment of consecration and never would, because they did not comprehend the most basic doctrine of the Scriptures, the efficacy of the Word. They looked at the plain words of the Bible the way a cow would look at a newly painted fence, stunned and bewildered.
Someone who is only an Enthusiast about justification, but not about Holy Communion, is still an Enthusiast and doubly dangerous. He does not understand or teach justification by faith in the Sacraments. How can he? The newborn was already declared forgiven, before he was born, so Holy Baptism has nothing to do with the Old Adam or anything else. Holy Communion is merely symbolic, because the communicant is already forgiven.
One pastor on LutherQueasy said this about confession and absolution: "I told him that he was forgiven before he even came to confess." So, maybe he can keep that luscious secretary on the payroll?
Twenty Years and Counting:
Stupidity from the Sausage Factory
Reuel Schulz supposedly earned two STMs at Mequon, yet he also studied under Pentecostal Pete Wagner at Fuller Seminary. After reading the recent history of Mequon, anyone can conclude - "The faculty promotes anti-Lutheran Enthusiasm while calling themselves confessional Lutherans."
Larry Olson's congregation never grew, so WELS hired him to teach Church Growth at its shrinking college. He earned a DMin from Fuller Seminary, the first of the Shrinker-Enthusiasts in WELS with a drive-by degree: Rick Krause, Paul Calvin Kelm, Steve Witte, John Parlow added to the shame.
Walther commanded, "Make a decision for Christ," so people rightfully call him the Father of the Syn Conference. The great thing about being born already forgiven is the way one can ignore adultery, kidnap a few kids for their own good, evade arrest warrants, and usurp the adulterer. Walther dishonestly organized a mob against Stephan and robbed him, rather than moving forward in a Christian, brotherly way. As his disciples will say today, "Matthew 18 is for suckers and losers - mobs are more fun and far more effective."
No wonder they worship the grounds Sig Becker once occupied as the Zwingli Professor of Enthusiasm:
- He published against the efficacy of the Word in WELS' battle against their own brother in Mankato, B. Teigen, who proved with genuine scholarship that the Syn Conference was wrong about their Receptionism. One WELS pastor told me, with a straight face, "The elements become the Body and Blood of Christ when the communicant receives them."
- He supported the excommunication of two WELS families who dared to question the precious but obviously new dogma of Universal Objective Justification.
- He published this bald-faced lie, when anyone with a superficial knowledge of the Gausewitz catechism realizes the falsity of this unsupported claim. Why support the lie with quotations? Research makes one late for dinner.
Thursday, June 23, 2011
Wikipedia Knows More about the KJV
Than the Sausage Factory Professors
Wikipedia on Tyndale, which became the KJV
The chain of events that led to the creation of Tyndale’s New Testament started in 1522. It was in this year that Tyndale illegally acquired a copy of Martin Luther’s German New Testament. Tyndale was inspired by Luther’s work and immediately set out to imitate Luther’s work but in English.[3] He made his purpose known to the Bishop of London at the time Cuthbert Tunstall. Hewing to his Catholic faith, for which he would later be imprisoned, Bishop Tunstall refused Tyndale permission to write this heretical text. After this rejection Tyndale moved to the continent and ended up in Hamburg where he completed his New Testament in 1524.[4] During this time period Tyndale frequented Wittenberg where he consulted with Martin Luther and his associate Melanchthon.[3]
Asking about Walther and Calvin
Northwest SD Lutheran has left a new comment on your post "Dr. Lito Cruz on Predestination. Chemnitz Delivers...":
I remember Nagel once saying in a sermon that what God wants to do he cannot do by force. If faith is cultivated by Godly force it is coercion and not faith. Coercion leads one to be universalistic and then atheistic because there is no need for Christ or his merits. Am I on to something here?
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GJ - The running and planting quotation from the Formula of Concord, below, is very good. Chemnitz dealt with the Calvinists more than Luther did, because Calvin pretended to be Lutheran until Westphal flushed him out of the tall grass.
I do not like dealing with speculative theology. There is a difference between what God could do and what He does do through His gracious will. Lutherans have neglected the efficacy of the Word and the Means of Grace. That should be our focus.
The priestly elite is threatened by an articulate, informed laity.
AC V - Asking about Holy Communion
- Inquiring minds want to know: Does Holy Communion grant the actual forgiveness of sins or the assurance that sins have been forgiven? If the full treasure of God's forgiveness is fully ours by faith worked by Word and Sacrament, then what need is there for Word and Sacrament? In other words, after conversion do the means of grace work the forgiveness of sins, or the assurance that sins have been forgiven? Give us an illustration on how it works.
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GJ - The Word conveys Christ and His benefits to us, so Holy Communion as the visible Gospel grants forgiveness. I believe the wording about assurance is meant to be a dodge, and it fits well with WELSian UOJness.
I am trying to recall the CW wording, from tippling Tiefel, but I never used the book.
Once the UOJ clergy teach that everyone is already forgiven, Hindu and Eskimo alike, without faith, the rest does not matter. WELS has been so good at pronouncing everything adiaphora that doctrine is also a matter of indifference.
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Brett Meyer has left a new comment on your post "Lutheran Leaders, Trained by Fuller Seminary, Doub...":
AC V, the false gospel of Universal Objective Justification goes so far as to confess that it's only the declaration that "your sins are already forgiven" that is capable of creating faith.
Remember that it was DP Buchholz, who will go down in history as the one who exhumed Siegbert W. Beckers bones to ensure that this generation would completely abandoned Justification by Faith, who taught that faith could only be created based on forgiveness already declared and never on the promise of the forgiveness of sins through faith.
Note that it was under the so-called Conservative (W)ELS administration (Buchholz and Schroeder) that the first family since Kokomo have been excommunicated for confessing Justification by Faith Alone and showing that Justification without and before faith is neither taught in Scripture or confessed in the Book of Concord. Certainly a monumental event in the degradation of the (W)ELS.
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GJ - WELS has no sense of irony - excommunicating for doubting their precious UOJ, which claims they were were born forgiven. As Joe Krohn has recorded on his blog, he and his wife were glad to discuss the doctrinal problems with Patterson and the elders. Patterson refused and excommunicated them.
The other excommunication, in Appleton, took place because Rick Techlin followed what WELS leaders insisted upon.
Because WELS is stuck on its priestly infallibility, the chances of resolution are slight.
Let My People Go Already.
Moses As a Dude
Mo-Mentality
Moses was a man's man. He yelled at people, went on long desert hikes, hit things when he was upset, and beat people up. On the other hand, he was sometimes a wimp, a coward, and made a lot of excuses, yet God made him into a leader. What can we learn from Moses?| Origins | 6-05-2011 | Notes:  |
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| Getting It | 6-12-2011 | Notes: |
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| Strength | 6-19-2011 | Notes: |
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Be a Clown, Be a Clown, Everyone Loves a Clown.
Returning to the Plain Words of Scripture
And the Doctrinal Witness of the Book of Concord
"Now, although both, the planting and watering of the preacher, and the running and willing of the hearer, would be in vain, and no conversion would follow it if the power and efficacy of the Holy Ghost were not added thereto, who enlightens and converts the hearts through the Word preached and heard, so that men believe this Word and assent thereto, still, neither preacher nor hearer is to doubt this grace and efficacy of the Holy Ghost, but should be certain that when the Word of God is preached purely and truly, according to the command and will of God, and men listen attentively and earnestly and meditate upon it, God is certainly present with His grace, and grants, as has been said, what otherwise man can neither accept nor give from his own powers."
Formula of Concord SD II. #55-56. Free Will. Concordia Triglotta, St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1921, p. 903. Tappert, p. 531f. Heiser, p. 246.
Psalms 147:15-18 (KJV) He sendeth forth his commandment upon earth: his word runneth very swiftly. {16} He giveth snow like wool: he scattereth the hoarfrost like ashes. {17} He casteth forth his ice like morsels: who can stand before his cold? {18} He sendeth out his word, and melteth them: he causeth his wind to blow, and the waters flow.
The Lutheran clergy want to be priests who impress their audiences with exotic terms - not bothering to explain them, if they could.
I often hear the UOJ Enthusiasts condemn justification by faith, throwing out a red herring, intuitu fidei. That means as much, undefined, as the term grace. Roman Catholics promote grace (plus works), but they say grace. The reason for the popularity of Amazing Grace is its vagueness. Uncoverted Inuits could sing it with gusto, Tim Glende's inuitu fidei.
A discerning layman will ask, for instance. "Do you believe we are justified without faith? Before we are born?"
Or - "Has God pronounced the entire world, Hindu and cannibals alike, forgiven of its sin?"
Or - "Is everyone in Hell a guilt-free saint, as taught infallibly by the Wisconsin Sect?"
Citing intuitu fidei does not display one's education but a lack of it. The MDiv graduates who engage in this farce are simply trying to dazzle laity and confuse them.
The Little Three are one generation or less from self-extinction. No one cares what made The Kidnapper fuss and fume. They want to hear the Gospel. The Syn Conference is now so deep into navel-gazing that they believe their ministry of condemnation is working somewhere, in spite of evidence to the contrary.
I might have mentioned this before--on 6,700 posts--the Little Three obviously have no use for the Means of Grace, since they have skimmed millions of dollars income to fund study at Fuller Seminary and the other beehives of Enthusiasm. Not once has a solid, principled condemnation of Enthusiasm come forth, with an equally forceful emphasis upon the Means of Grace.
The Word of God can change this, but not until there is genuine repentance from top down, a rejection of sophomoric posturing to preserve the Fuller elite, an extensive new look at the nuda Triglotta, without all the fluff from overpaid staffers.
Isaiah, mighty seer, in days of old
The Lord of all in spirit did behold
High on a lofty throne, in splendor bright,
With flowing train that filled the temple quite.
Above the throne were stately seraphim;
Six wings had they, these messengers of Him.
With twain they veiled their faces, as was meet,
With twain in reverent awe they hid their feet,
And with the other twain aloft they soared,
One to the other called and praised the Lord:
"Holy is God, the Lord of Sabaoth!
Holy is God, the Lord of Sabaoth!
Holy is God, the Lord of Sabaoth!
Behold, His glory filleth all the earth!"
The beams and lintels trembled at the cry,
And clouds of smoke enwrapped the throne on high.
Symbols:
Lutheran and Otherwise
We'll take your church and just leave you some small change."
AC V has left a new comment on your post "The Preached Word Is God's Instrument of Grace":
Your photo with caption brought to mind what John Brug said in the Spring 2011 WLQ: "Substance is more important than symbols, but the importance of symbols of preaching should not be underestimated. Well-chosen symbols reflect and build inner attitudes. If symbols like vestments and pulpits say to people that the preacher believes he is set apart from the crowd, then they are functioning as very effective symbols and conveying their intended meaning....
Symbols are intended to express and reinforce values. Though some laughed at his action as pretentious, there was a reason President-elect Obama felt a need to stand behind a podium with a seal of the Office of President-Elect. There is a reason that presidents often speak from the Oval Office. Historically, symbols have always functioned as signs of office. If a preacher is embarrassed by symbols because he is embarrassed by the concept of office, he needs to examine his understanding of his role."
WELS readers, do you see a trend among your pastors to wander from the pulpit when preaching, just like the TV preachers (or like Time of Grace Jeske)? Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.
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GJ - Pentecostal churches have stages and pit bands.
Roman Catholic churches have altars and almost no pulpit.
Methodist and Presbyterian churches have large pulpits and almost no altar, perhaps a table, more like a card table.
Babtists have pulpits and an immersion tub, because immersion is required. Lenski - "The only ones immersed in the Bible were those who drowned in the Flood."
Wandering from the pulpit is a gimmick, and a dumb one at that. When Lutherans doubt the efficacy of the Word, they imitate those who mock the efficacy of the Word.
The Preached Word Is God's Instrument of Grace
AC V has left a new comment on your post "The Basics of the Christian Faith. Misleading for ...":
Pastoral Work in the Word
"The pastor has no other calling than to preach his own sermons, based on his own study. He should offer the Sacraments without hesitation or shame, and to take Word out on visits to shut-ins, the hospitalized, the grieving, and the spiritually indolent."
So simple, yet so hard.
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GJ - Simple and fulfilling. The difficult part is bearing the cross. Those who reject the cross--any difficulty associated with the pure Word--are the ones who reject the Gospel, even if they dress in fancy robes and fold their hands just so.
Lutheran Leaders, Trained by Fuller Seminary,
Doubt the Word,
So They Teach against Faith
How does this doctrinal statement from the Formula of Concord affect you? I think it clarifies the power and effectiveness of Holy Communion. These words support and clarify faith in God, trust in His Word.
That old harlot Reason loves to say, "How can this be?" I read on one forum about non-Lutherans avoiding the Consecration and unionists of the Lutheran Left using similar words. Holy Communion is symbolic, and it is a memorial meal, in remembrance of the Last Supper. Christ is indeed spiritually present. But stopping there is a denial of the Word.
Jesus said, in plain Greek (since there is no Hebrew or Aramaic text) - "This is My Body."
He did not say, "This My Body" to confuse people. Greek is very good in the state of being verbs, which are irregular. I spent half of college memorizing irregular Greek verbs. (Thus I am never wrong, according to TG). LI was so good in Greek that NWC hired him to tutor others.
Jesus did not say, "This symbolizes My Body."
Nor did He say, "In the future, this will be My Body, but not right now, because the rationalists cannot handle that concept."
Holy Communion is the Gospel, using the Gospel itself to consecrate the elements: "given for you, for the forgiveness of sin."
Those who say, "We do not know when it is the Body and Blood of Christ" are fools who do not trust the power of the Word. Omitting the consecration has the same effect.
What do the Maggot Churches (Emergent Churches) do in Lutherdom? They hide the Sacraments because they trust in Willow Creek and Mars Hill, but not in God's Word. That is also why the Maggot Churches want a feminazi translation with Adam turned into a clever myth. Leading the way - Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary.
I was 25 years ahead on ELCA's apostasy. Only a few years ago, I taunted the ELCA congregations about leaving Whorely Mother Synod, following the example of the Episcopal Church breakup. At this point, no one can keep up with the exits from ELCA. LCMC has about 800 congregations. The bishops' synod, NALC, brand new, has around 200.
Thousands of letters of thanks are rolling in. Not exactly. My predictions about WELS are already coming true, at this convention. The SP has ordered a major cover-up on the MLC gay video, and the seminary is promoting the NNIV. The entire synod switched from justification by faith to Universal Objective Justification--from Gausewitz to Kuske--and no one noticed.
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Dr. Lito Cruz on Predestination.
Chemnitz Delivers the Conclusion
I have studied some bits of predestination when I was a Charismaniac and turned Calvinist. I came with the conclusion that if I were to be a Calvinist, the only logical position is to be SupraLapsarian. Praise God I got delivered from Calvinism.
At any rate, today I reason that surely I must grant that if God knows everything, then surely God knew that I would believe when he presents the Gospel to me. I said, surely that must be granted. This is not being an Arminian, it stands to reason that if God foreknew, he knew everything beforehand including my standing up and sitting down, that includes my faith. The authors seems to argue for a neither Arminian nor Calvinistic understanding of predestination - hence, a Lutheran view.
The question is this - did God predestine us based on the foreknowledge of that faith? I have no Biblical data for this yet and I am of course very happy to learn. However, I now must grant the point that God knew my faith, nevertheless. Yet Calvinist do not put any weight to this. That is why when taken to final conclusion, you cannot distinguish God from Allah under those terms.
Calvinistic universalism goes like this - since God is Sovereign and since he wants all to be saved, his Sovereignty is never thwarted and so all will be saved.
When I read the articulation of Missouri based on the book Errors of Missouri, I have no doubts that Walther and Co have fallen into the Calvinist paradigm. Which is why I chuckle why they are allergic to Calvinists when in fact Calvinists would be happy at their articulation of predestination!!!
Glende's scholarship has nothing to offer, he simply says "ooh, Schmidt and Stellenhorn etc believe in intuitu fidei". He assumes by default it is wrong and he does not deal with the arguments of the authors. He offers no counter arguments and no counter data. The argument used is band wagon. What he can do is to get the best argument from anti-Missouris and shoot it down from Scripture but we do not see that in his posts. The teacher in me can not help but mark his posts down.
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GJ - Calvinism easily passes into Universalism, as Lito observed. Karl Barth, the main theologian for Fuller Seminary, advocated Universalism in his Dogmatics. Actually, Barth's hawt mistress did most the writing.
UOJ is cowardly Universalism. If the Little Three keep promoting it, they will produce Universalists and atheists for the next generation. They already have. I know several key WELS Shrinkers who either open, loud atheists or pan-religionists.
The UOJ Advocates are Shrinkers, and the Shrinkers slaver over UOJ - Valleskey, Glende, Bivens, et al.
AC V on Luther's Romans Commentary.
Do You Believe Your Sect or Your Lying Eyes?
AC V has left a new comment on your post "AC V - Grabbing St. Paul by the Shoulders, Teachin...":
Luther's commentary on Romans 3 (Nota bene: no "all" clarification of Paul's "intended meaning"):
"That is why faith alone makes someone just and fulfills the law; faith it is that brings the Holy Spirit through the merits of Christ. The Spirit, in turn, renders the heart glad and free, as the law demands. Then good works proceed from faith itself. That is what Paul means in chapter 3 when, after he has thrown out the works of the law, he sounds as though the wants to abolish the law by faith. No, he says, we uphold the law through faith, i.e. we fulfill it through faith."
AC V has left a new comment on your post "AC V - Grabbing St. Paul by the Shoulders, Teachin...":
I would like to add Luther's commentary on Romans 5, key to understanding that vv. 18-19 esp. do not teach UOJ:
"Next St. Paul makes a digression, a pleasant little side-trip, and relates where both sin and justice, death and life come from. He opposes these two: Adam and Christ. What he wants to say is that Christ, a second Adam, had to come in order to make us heirs of his justice through a new spiritual birth in faith, just as the old Adam made us heirs of sin through the old fleshy birth.
St. Paul proves, by this reasoning, that a person cannot help himself by his works to get from sin to justice any more than he can prevent his own physical birth. St. Paul also proves that the divine law, which should have been well-suited, if anything was, for helping people to obtain justice, not only was no help at all when it did come, but it even increased sin. Evil human nature, consequently, becomes more hostile to it; the more the law forbids it to indulge its own desires, the more it wants to. Thus the law makes Christ all the more necessary and demands more grace to help human nature."
The Basics of the Christian Faith.
Misleading for Future Sausage Factory Graduates
Best Bible Translation
First of all, people need an accurate Bible translation. For years, WELS Leftists have bewitched people with the union NIV. The same apostates now want to force the New NIV on everyone, a translation simply loaded with political and anti-Christian views (such as Adam as a myth and feminazi language).
The KJV has direct lineage from Luther. Tyndale was burned at the stake for producing the first all-English translation from the original languages, a prodigious feat. Luther's Bible is called the uncle of the English Bible. Luther's influence upon Tyndale is traced in this website.
Without a good Bible, people are led into the wilderness of Enthusiasm, because the bad translations are inaccurate, political, and anti-Sacramental. They also eliminate many verses from the New Testament, based on theories less substantial than the Area 51 landings.
The Little Three have completely failed in Biblical leadership, for promoting substandard, erroneous, and misleading translations, abandoning the Nephew of Luther's Bible, the KJV.
The Little Three could easily use the KJV 21 or another modern version of the KJV. I still prefer the KJV and can easily explain unusual wordings like "our conversation is in heaven."
The Efficacy of the Word
The Scriptures reveal the efficacy of the Word. Isaiah 55:8-11 clearly teaches that God's Word always contains the divine power and purpose of the Holy Spirit. This constant association of the Holy Spirit and the Word gives us certainty about God's will and actions.
KJV Isaiah 55:8 For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD. 9 For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. 10 For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to
the eater: 11 So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.
Doubting Efficacy Is Anti-Biblical, Anti-Lutheran
Doubting the efficacy of the Word is blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, showing an antagonism toward the Scriptures and Lutheran doctrine. Luther consistently taught the efficacy of the Word because he was a faithful exegete throughout his ministry.
KJV 1 Corinthians 3:6 I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase. 7 So then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase. 8 Now he that planteth and he that watereth are one: and every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labour.
The explosion of methods, programs, plans, surveys, statistics, and entertainment can be linked to a lack of trust in God's Word. For that reason, clergy plan instead of preaching. They rely on pre-digested materials instead of teaching on the basis of their own study of the Word. They do not take the Gospel to their own shut-in members, let alone the unbelievers and spiritually inert.
The Gospel
The entire Bible, says Luther, is a sermon about Jesus. The Gospel not only includes Christ dying for the sins of the world, but all promises and blessings from God.
The primary preaching of the Law is to show people this sin - that they do not utterly trust in Christ for their forgiveness.
KJV John 16:8 And when He [the Holy Spirit] is come, He will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: 9 Of sin, because they believe not on Me; 10 Of righteousness, because I go to my Father, and ye see Me no more; 11 Of judgment, because the prince of this world is judged.
KJV John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. 17 For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. 18 He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
Thus the Gospel plants and sustains faith in the hearts of those who hear it. God creates and sustains this faith through His Gospel and declares us forgiven - justification by faith.
The Visible Word
Holy Baptism and Holy Communion are the Gospel in visible form, always efficacious. For that reason we should always uphold the blessing of infant baptism and teach against those Baptists and Pentecostals who denounce it as heresy.
Likewise, Holy Communion must be closed and offered frequently to demonstrate the significance of the Word in saving and condemning.
Pastoral Work in the Word
The pastor has no other calling than to preach his own sermons, based on his own study. He should offer the Sacraments without hesitation or shame, and to take Word out on visits to shut-ins, the hospitalized, the grieving, and the spiritually indolent.
Luther and the Book of Concord
Ankle-biters like to go over minor conflicts from the last century, so they can spend a few more months pounding an issue rather than teaching the Gospel. If they spent time with the sermons of Luther and the Book of Concord, they would have something to teach.
The study of Luther's doctrine has been in complete collapse for decades, with all the synod leaders (Big Four) spending their time with the Enthusiasts at Fuller Seminary, Willow Creek, Mars Hill, Trinity Divinity, Granger, North Point, Sweet, and worse.
If a pastor or pastoral candidate understands the efficacy of the Word, he will make that the foundation of all he does, excluding:
- Most living authors.
- Synodical position papers, essays, and other trivia.
- Sermonic books.
Given the Biblical teaching of the efficacy of the Word in the Means of Grace, there can be no forgiveness apart from that faith created by the Gospel.
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