Hi, Gregory, I am about half way through reading the new edition of Thy Strong Word and getting loads of benefit from it.
Free PDF of Thy Strong Word.
The book really has been strengthened in this revision. Of course, the most important improvement is the coverage of the awful U.O.J. heresy; your exposure of it and of its ignominy is downright magisterial!
I love all that stuff, too, about gardening, which is touching, intimate, and wonderfully loving, for the plants and for the humans alike. Don't let anyone tell you, uncontested, otherwise!
I can't garden myself, due to my debilitating allergies (of sinus and skin alike), but I appreciate lovely gardens. Fortunately, I have a very ample and beautiful one that takes care of itself, here in the verdant Abitibi: lots of wild roses, wild berry trees, shrubs, trees aplenty, etc., and no need to do much to them, those I have translated some. I am lucky to have such a self-sustaining, self-regulating garden and I greatly appreciate it and the little animals who thrive in it, birds, chipmunks, local cats who prowl through the bushes, etc.
Gerald Parker
***
GJ - Gerald Parker and I go back quite a few years. We met at the KJV conference in Kokomo, Indiana, in the late 90s. He and several other Lutheran laymen encouraged me to pursue the topic of UOJ (everyone born forgiven) compared to the Biblical justification by faith.
The gathering took place at the farm of one family kicked out of WELS for questioning UOJ. I talked to both men about how it happened. I also received copies of the original letters sent them.
WELS still lies about Kokomo, claiming the Kokomo Theses were made up by the families who were kicked out. And why were they kicked out? For making up a "parody of the WELS doctrine justification."
These men told me how they were startled by Pastor Papenfuss talking up UOJ, who gave them a copy of J. P. Meyer's Ministers of Christ to shore up his argument. The laymen copied three statements from the book and added a fourth one from an earlier controversy. They asked the pastor if that was a fair summary of justification, according to WELS. Papenfuss said it was.
Papenfuss admitted to the men, in the same kitchen where we were talking, that he never heard of UOJ until he reached seminary at Mequon.
No surprise - the president of The Sausage Factory, Paul Wendland, loves the New NIV because the NNIV inserts UOJ into Romans 3.
Wendland is a wee bit Church Growthy too.
