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Reviewing the July 4, 2016 Issue of Christian News. No Fireworks. Reading CN So You Don't Have To

LCMS Pastor Therwanger post with an unnamed friend.

LCMS Harold Therwanger is on he far left, with Nunes next to him.

Nunes and Therwanger.
Nunes' organist murdered an olderly woman
and the pastor easily found more lucrative work elsewhere.

Christian News:
First Immanuel overwhelmingly voted to keep Therwanger as its pastor after he announced he planned to wed his same-sex partner.

Dr. John Nunes, the congregation’s associate pastor, who heard Therwanger’s announcement, did
not show the homosexual senior pastor what the Bible teaches about homosexuality. Reports in
this issue show that Nunes, when he was a professor at Valparaiso University, did not oppose this
school’s support of same-sex marriage.

LCMS President Matthew Harrison, a long time close friend of Nunes, will be preaching at the
service in Bronxville, New York, when Nunes is installed as president of Concordia College, New
York. It may be the first time a college in the LCMS’s Concordia University System has a president
divorced from his first wife. Some articles CN has published about Nunes and his theology follow.

LCMS Pastor - has this been covered in CN?

Flogging Old Stories
If you liked previous issues of Christian News, you will love this one - the same content over and over.

Unanswered - why does Christian News run interference for Pastor Tom Brock, claiming Tom's letter was sent to me when no letter ever appeared. OK, I have donated all of Europe to Lutheran News, Inc. The title was sent to you in the mail. The return address reads - The Donation of Ichabod. If CN denies this magnificent gift was sent, I will call them various names.

Lately the themes of CN have been -
Harrison being re-elected.
Kloha and the so-called plastic text of the Bible.

Here is a timely farewell note from a WELS pastor -

Harrison – An Accomplished Politician 
Dear Herman, 
I like the new format of CN – it’s much easier for me to read. Also, I am astounded that so few are resisting the false teaching of Kloha. I can’t but feel that Harrison is an accomplished politician who can speak out of both sides of his mouth and deceive people – like our WELS leaders. Ignorance is bliss. 
WELS clergyman

Mark Schroeder's elimination squad will hunt this fellow down and eliminate him from the ministry. The observation is correct. I recall Harrison saying the Minnesota DP was wrong to steal the campus church and sell it, but the DP was within his power to do it. The offended supporters of the chapel said "Hurray. Harrison is on our side!" In fact, Harrison was pulling the rug out from under all those who objected to the theft.

Historically, the LCMS was founded on property fraud, theft of the bishop's gold, and kidnapping - all blessed by CFW Walther. Harrison is a Waltherian - at least he wants people to believe that claim.

Ever since, Synodical  Conference Lutherans have been willing to exchange one pope for another.

Kloha and Text Criticism
The incredibly funny "rules" of text criticism, invented by apostates Wescott and Hort, illustrate how this science is really a marvelous way to fool those who consider themselves intellectual while leaving the laity behind.

Let me be blunt for once. Most "conservative" Lutheran clergy are helpless in Greek and they know even less about text criticism (not there is much to know). At least Kloha does not grin like a Chesire Cat, not wanting to imitate the contented bovine smile of Moo from Wheaton College (NNIV salesman).

Moo of Wheaton

When the simpletons of Lutherdom began abandoning the King James Version in droves, they had a chance to update the KJV themselves or adopt a conservative update like the KJV21. After all, the KJV we use is a modest update of the original.

But no - the apostates ran after every new translation like Gadarene pigs, because they were infected with the swine virus called Universal Objective Justification.

The so-called conservatives are just versions of ELCA, some a bit more retro than others, but following the same rapid spiral downward from Pietistic Enthusiasm.

Historic St. John Lutheran Church in Milwaukee, after being kicked out of WELS and stolen by two members and a lawyer, is now welcomed back into WELS with those two thieves and their ELCA pastor. The men may not be hetero, but they are thoroughly Waltherian.

Beneficial Insects Dress Like the Costumed Cops of Disneyland To Protect the Roses While Feeding Their Young

Tachinid Fly

Long ago Team Jackson went to Disneyland. We got to see our favorite characters in giant costumes.

As many people know, the underground passages allow the characters to emerge seemingly like magic.

We heard that many of them are actually involved in security, so they keep an eye on everything in their casual, friendly, appealing costumes.

Once I read about Tachinid Flies, I wondered when I would see them. Unbidden, they came to our garden to do their work. I see them all over the garden.

Tachinid flies FAMILY Tachinidae 
NORTH AMERICAN SPECIES 1300+ 

You may not think a fly to be all that interesting, but I can assure you that this large and diverse family of parasitoids participates in some of the most fascinating interactions in the insect world. Tachinids are among my favorite of all natural enemies, and it surely isn’t for their good looks. It is instead for the intriguing lives of these humble-looking creatures. 

Tachinid flies are highly variable in their physical appearance. Measuring primarily 0.12–0.55 inch (3–14 mm), with a few larger and smaller species, they most resemble plain old houseflies. Tachinids can be gray, black, or darkly striped and have distinctive hairy bristles protruding from their abdomens. Some species have four black longitudinal stripes on their thorax (the part of the body between the head and the abdomen). The presence of only three stripes indicates it is instead a flesh fly—you know, the ones that eat carrion and poop. A few species of tachinids are bright orange or even metallic blue or green, but most are just plain drab. If you really want to discern them from a housefly, look for a pronounced subscutellum, best described as a distinct rounded ridge on their posterior. I, for one, am not all that interested in examining a fly’s posterior, so I rely more on the presence of the abdominal bristles for identification.

Tachinid flies, parasitoids that resemble bristly houseflies, feed on pollen, nectar, and honeydew and are highly variable in appearance and size. Most are dark in color, though a few brightly colored species exist. 

Adult tachinids feed on pollen, nectar, and honeydew and are important pollinators. They are very active fliers and are often seen alighting on flowers, fences, rocks, and people. All species of tachinids are parasitoids that use various insects as larval hosts. Most species use caterpillars (cabbage loopers, corn borers, gypsy moths, cutworms, fall armyworms, coddling moth larvae, leaf rollers, bollworms, and many, many others) as hosts while other species parasitize adult and larval beetles, and even various true bugs and sawfly larvae. Tachinids can be generalists that use assorted species as larval hosts or specialists relying on only one species to feed their developing young. 

Egg-laying techniques are variable and incredibly intriguing. Some species deposit one or more eggs onto the host insect’s exterior or (rarely) inject the egg inside the host. Others lay an egg near a leaf-munching pest; when the egg hatches a few hours later, it is ingested right along with the plant tissue. Still other species deposit live larvae into the host. For those species that lay eggs on their hosts externally, the 0.04 inch (1 mm) white elongated eggs are easy to spot, particularly when clinging to caterpillars and host insects like Japanese beetles, squash bugs, and stink bugs. Once hatched, the larval maggot begins to consume the host’s internal tissues and completes its feeding in four to fourteen days. In most cases, the larva then emerges from the dying host and pupates independently.

Walliser, Jessica. Attracting Beneficial Bugs to Your Garden: A Natural Approach to Pest Control (Kindle Locations 846-859). Timber Press. Kindle Edition. 

When I see flies in the garden, they are Tachinids, either gathering pollen as adults or laying eggs that will hatch into maggots that live on aphids.

The first bloom of roses provided food for the adults and a pleasant nursery for their young. Just like last year, the white and Peace roses were drained by aphids. I did not panic. No toxic sprays were used. Instead, I waited for beneficial creatures to come to the rescue.

This miniature bee is just fooling -
he is a Flower Fly or Hover Fly - Syrphid.

Dressed as

• Spiders, 
• Tiny wasps (Ichneumons), 
• Miniature bees (Flower Flies),  and 
• Houseflies (Tachinids) -

these beneficial creatures turned the rose garden into a food court, The aphids needed food, but they only created a banquet for the beneficial creatures, which multiplied to feed on the feeders. Not one, but many beneficials came to the rescue. All the roses can bloom for the rest of the summer without much damage at all. If a few blooms are damaged, it is only to keep the food cycle going.