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.
Joel Hochmuth, WELS, got public absolution without repenting, a top lawyer, and one year of easy work-release, which he violated.
The sainted Gutsche was WELS and CLC, died in the Canadian ELCiC, arrested as an ELCA pastor, lying about the circumstances.
November 26th, 2018
A Letter of Disclosure from the Office of the Bishop
Dear St. Matthew Lutheran Church,
In shock and with much sadness, I write to inform you that Pr. Steve Sabin, the lead pastor of Christ Church Lutheran in San Francisco since 2001, has been arrested and arraigned on charges of possessing and distributing child pornography on the internet. Pr. Sabin is currently out of jail on bail and chose to plead not guilty at his arraignment. I have spoken with Pr. Sabin and encouraged him to seek pastoral care and support for him and for his spouse, Travis. He has resigned his call and will no longer be serving as the pastor of Christ Church Lutheran.
Our office has been in communication the President and the Church Council of Christ Church and the Conference Dean, Pr. John Kuehner. The deans and rostered leaders of the four Bay Area Conferences (where there has been considerable media coverage about Pr. Sabin’s arrest) were notified late last week of his arrest and the response of the Office of the Bishop to these events. Pr. Katy Grindberg and I attended Christ Church Lutheran on Christ the King Sunday and after worship, met with the congregation and the Church Council to offer our presence, prayers and support on your behalf. Following that visit, I believe now is the appropriate time to offer this disclosure to the entire synod.
As you might imagine, Sunday was a very challenging day for the members of the congregation who have received Pr. Sabin’s ministry with much appreciation over the years and who are at a loss to understand how he has come to be charged with such egregious crimes. Many of you have already reached out to offer your support and prayers for the congregation – thank you. I pray we will all be led by the Spirit of Christ as each of us deals with our own feelings about this and as we encounter in others the range of emotions and responses many will have in receiving this news.
Moving forward, the Office of the Bishop will provide care for the leaders and members of Christ Church Lutheran, along with Pr. Tom McQueen and Pr. Kathleen Boyer-Visser, who will continue offering pastoral care and support for the congregation. Counseling services will be provided as requested, and an interim pastor will eventually begin serving as part of the transition to new pastoral leadership for the ministry of Christ Church. For now, there are concerns and hopes for this vital ministry in the Sunset District of San Francisco that are being addressed, including its ongoing work and witness and the need to repair damage caused by a fire in the basement of the church earlier this year. Your continuing prayers will be much appreciated.
Blessings as we prepare to celebrate Advent in hope and trust that the light, peace and reign of Christ continues to break into our world.
Peace,
Bishop Mark W. Holmerud
Addendum -- For those who have not heard this news, a link to one of the media reports on this story is below:
She heard "Treats!" Sassy is the cyber-pet for many blog fans.
Sassy uses her legs as powerful communication devices. One is her levels of urgency when she on the bed and I am resting or reading:
Very gentle, steady pressure - duties await.
Light swat at my leg - you know what is coming up.
Single scrape across the kneecap - I mean it now.
Double scrape, kneecap, vigorous - No more stalling. This is when I tell Chris to watch for the triple-scrape, which does not hurt.
Sassy makes a surprised noise about my reluctance and drags her claws across my kneecap three times, faster and harder than before.
At this point I burst into laughter, because she has worked up to the ultimate, you-cannot-ignore-this signal. She enjoys the laughter because she is a clown who wants to entertain us and anyone else who is observing her.
She has more tricks. One is the scrape in the air. That began as scraping the antique table, which made a lot of noise with her claws. I did not see where the odd noise came from, and it happened only when I was concentrating. Finally I caught her and glared at her. She withdrew looking very guilty. The next time I laughed and she realized the joke. From that time on, a scrape on the table was done with a big grin. "Am I smart and funny too?" We moved a metal table to that place and the noise was very strange. I repeated my fierce look. She paused, grinned, and did it again.
Now there is a narrow shelf in the same place. She cannot easily reach it, so she reaches up in the air and scrapes the imaginary table, grinning. "Oh my, Sassy. What do you want? Crunchies? A walk? Frosty Paws? Lovey time?"
She may answer by being happy and energetic, or by slumping on the bed as if she is burdened by thick-headed staff. Normally, lovey time means she will not come to us but looks defiant. "Do I have to draaaag you?" She looks frightened at the thought. I reach out and touch her gently then say, "Move move." She jumps up and moves several inches. "Oh Sassy, you moochy pooch. You can move." She grins, moves close between and flops down.
The ideal lovey is when she comes up on her own, lays her front paw on Chris, grins, and listens to praise and encouragement. Once she has her quota from Chris, Sassy lays the same paw on me - it is my turn. I talk about her popularity in the neighborhood and the McDonalds staff loving her. That done, with some petting, she goes to her place and falls asleep.
From the article:
"Under Ohio law, institutions such as churches and schools have a duty to report allegations of physical or sexual abuse of a minor."
WELS does not think it has a duty to report. I talked to a Circuit Pastor, who first of all wanted to know my sources (so he could attack them) - typical tactic. Then he wanted to say he phoned because he "was concerned about me." I told him tears were rolling down my cheeks and shorting out my cell phone.
The CP, a member of the odious Patterson circle, insisted they had "no duty to report" even though Alaskan law was very clear that the people in authority were not to judge the case but refer it to the state. He kept yelling "Nothing happened." That must be part of the WELS cover-up kit:
Find the sources and attack them viciously.
Express deep concern for anyone angry about the situation.
Yell "Nothing happened!"
By the way, he wrote to me for my phone number and did not call. Once I identified that fact on this blog, he phoned. He was obviously disturbed that I knew about the DP flying in to reverse the firing. "Nothing happened!" I asked, "If nothing happened, why did they immediately change the parish constitution and reverse the firing, after being bullied by the DP?" My knowledge of the facts rattled him.
Robert Guenther: The Main Thing is the Main Thing. Seriously. He changed his website name to http://www.themainthing.us. On the front page: Helping You Keep The Main Thing The Main Thing
The main thing is honesty and obeying the law, not being lawless and devious, extending a call instead of dealing with an issue. That is the Wisconsin Sect that Otten defends so vigorously.
What if WELS had acknowledged its duty to report in the first incident with Joel Hochmuth?
This photo shows how tough the Moline teachers were.
I started the Moline Memories blog in 2010. I thought some recollections might be interesting for our grandchildren in the distant future. Writing creates a need for research, so I learned a lot about our area: John Deere, the celebrities born or raised in Moline, the important leaders of the past.
I report on our the Moline High Class of 1966 - The Class the Stars Fell On. We have a growing list of Golden Wedding Anniversaries, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren.
Views were very few at first, a few dozen a day. Now they average several thousand a month. I enjoy the shift in most seen for the week, which shows readers picking up on topics from the past and reading them.
It helps that my mother was one of the best teachers in an excellent school system and my father was a legendary baker. Classmates have asked me to re-start Melo-Cream and make more long johns and cinnamon fries for them.
On February 3rd, 1959, a small plane took off in a winter storm and crashed immediately, killing Buddy Holly, J. P. Richardson (The Big Bopper), Ritchie Valens, and the pilot.
On a Winter Dance Tour, their last concert was at Clear Lake, Iowa, near Mason City, hometown of the Music Man, Meredith Wilson.
Holly's early death was especially tragic, because he was a musical pioneer with great talent and a young wife. She was expecting but lost the child.
Don McLean coined the term the day the music died in his song "American Pie." The song became a perennial hit, encouraging the fad of inexplicable lyrics. One attempt to decode the song is located here.
Holly's songs are classic pop, simple and evocative.
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Dave Coopman has left a new comment on your post "February 3rd - The Day the Music Died":
The Winter Dance Tour played the Capitol Theater in Davenport on January 29, 1959. It was sponsored by KSTT, and for this appearance it was called the Concert of Stars, since it was the only venue where dancing could not take place. There was an ice storm in the Quint Cities that night, but the show was still sold out.
Strangely, no pictures of that night have ever turned up. There must be some somewhere.
Winter Dance Party Dates:
January 23 - Milwaukee, WI
January 24 - Kenosha, WI
January 25 - Mankato, MN
January 26 - Eau Claire, WI
January 27 - Montevideo, MN
January 28 - St. Paul, MN
January 29 - Davenport, IA
January 30 - Ft. Dodge, IA
January 31 - Duluth, MN
February 1 - Green Bay,WI
February 2 - Clear Lake, IA
Ken Berry, Moliner, recently celebrated his 85th birthday. He was known for Mayberry RFD, F Troop, and guesting on the Carol Burnett Show.
Zwingli was the first modern theologian, and Calvin followed the same subjective method. The appeal is to Zwingli's opinion, which became the norm. Why did the Anabaptists split with him? - they had feelings too.
The typical faithful member of a Lutheran congregation believes and thinks in a completely different century than their leaders. I recall a Missouri pastor complaining, "We did not have a single course on modern theology when I was in seminary." What a tragedy!
Most people think in terms of the Bible, the language of the 1500s, the basics of faith. They hear alien terms - like Objective Justification - and convert them into Biblical words - the Atonement. The reverse is true of modern theology, which includes Objective Justification and the de-mythologizing of Bultmann. They have a different meaning for all the Biblical terms and events. Rauschenbusch, Tillich, and Barth/Kirschbaum are pristine examples of this shell game.
The concepts of objective and subjective are reversed. Luther considered the Scriptures to be
the objective truth,
the Word of God,
the Book of the Holy Spirit,
one unified truth.
The modernists have an incessant need to rethink Biblical terminology. They are inherently subjective with favorite terms, favorite passages, and their own meanings. The Reformation popes in Rome began this erosion - "It is our Bible, so we will tell you what it means."
Zwingli, Calvin, and the Pietists continued this slippage:
Why argue over doctrine - we can work together.
I feel Luther and Paul were too harsh.
Grace means God forgives everyone, without contingencies - like faith.
Mythological terms like resurrection, divinity, and salvation need to be reconsidered in light of modern science. Bultmann, "Every schoolboy knows a corpse does not revive and leave a tomb."
"Let's teach Marxist revolution and call it the Dogmatics," Kirschbaum whispering to Barth in their summer cabin.
That is why the synods secretly love Christian News, its UOJ and Church Growth modernism.
Modern theologians have been thoroughly trained in modern philosophy, so they isolate terms and write a dissertation about one word - Agape, intent, etc - or about one of their living professors - the servant theology of John Howard Yoder.
Paul L. Holmer brilliantly described this approach as "about..." As long as we write and speak "(About) Paul's Concept of Salvation," we can pretend to be objective while promoting our own subjective interpretation. Then we can write chapters on Hellenistic and Pharisaic influences on Paul to show what a male chauvinist he was, a warning not to repeat those errors today.
If someone teaches Reformation theology (Luther, Melanchthon, Chemnitz, Book of Concord), he is teaching the substance of the Bible and Early Church. This is a minority view today and heavily censored.
The Lutheran faculty members are political appointees, selected for their loyalty to their denomination's stories and dogmas. Their path through higher education has immersed them in modern philosophy and modern theology. They are not concerned with the objective truth of God's Word or the Lutheran Reformation. Their ears are always attuned to the right use of terms.
The photographer wanted to know how to get Sassy Sue to pose for her portrait. I said, "Use the word treats, which makes her ears perk up." We watched as those ears went from resting to full alert each time, her eyes glowing.
The modernists listen for their favorite words of evasion and also for dangerous terms that make them growl. They love all the synonyms of world absolution without faith (OJ, UOJ, Justification of the World, General Justification). They refuse to say:
Justification by Faith.
John Sparky Brenner (WELS) writes: Individual Appropriation of Forgiveness, which seems to be a category of its own, neither Paul's nor Luther's, but neither SJ or anything else. (I am open to correction on this.)
Justification must be God's declaration, and from Moses (Genesis 15) to Paul's Epistles to Luther and beyond, that forensic declaration has always been "by faith," and always connected to the Means of Grace, the efficacy of the Gospel Word.
Otten, like John Sparky Brenner, cannot write the words Justification by Faith. I check each issue with a control-f to scan every article. For the UOJists, Justification by Faith is like garlic to the vampires. They say "the cross" but that means universal salvation to them, not the Atonement. The pity is, the errors have been repeated so often, and their pride is so ossified, that they cannot discern the difference between the Atonement and the blasphemy they teach.
A smooth liar like Jon-Boy Buchholz (WELS District Pope) will deny that WELS teaches universal salvation while promoting his precious essay that declares that to be so.
WELS banner for congregations to use - "We are saved, just like you." Jon-Boy denied this happened, but look at his blasphemies, enshrined in the WELS Holy of Holies, near Jay Webber's monstrosity.
One can apply the dogma of Halle to every Biblical example and see how preposterous it is, but that is the problem. The ELCA-WELS-LCMS-CLC (sic) are so subjective in their teaching that it only matters whether someone is faithful to the peculiar papacies. That is why they are in the sack together via Thrivent, always obedient to the far Left agenda, since they are disengaged from the Scriptures and Confessions as objective truth.
More than one pastor - maleducated by the Synodical Conference - has found his entire viewpoint changed by Luther's Reformation. I get that reaction when people read Thy Strong Word. I was at Mordor for the WELS enforced post-graduate course on Church Growth. As soon as the seniors graduated, they had to endure a week of Fuller dogma (Barth/Kirschbaum) from the carefully trained alumni of Fuller, though none dare tell the truth. The graduates were forced back for even more later. So WELS should be buying up ELCA properties for all their new missions, no? No.
WELS and CG reminded me of my seminary and pastoral counseling. The new dean converted many courses into pastoral counseling courses, his favorite topic. No matter what department, it ended up pastoral counseling. Now the seminary is mostly a school for counseling with a few MDivs in the program. Seminarians are the smallest part of the school now.
At Mordor, their mission festival was Paul Kelm and CG. The evangelism program was Paul Kelm and CG. Worship was CG. World Emissions - CG. Magazine articles - CG. Books - CG. Special programs, one requiring all pastors to attend - CG with Kelm, Olson (Drive-Buy DMin), and Huebner. Synod officers -
Wayne Mueller CG,
James Huebner Fuller alumnus CG,
David Valleskey Mordor Prez Fuller alumnus CG.
In the future, Mordor and the Little Seminary on the Prairie will be merged into a hallway at Concordia Seminary St. Louis - CG Department, one faculty member.
The Church Growth Movement - now Missional - has been a fantastic success at imposing Barth/Kirschbaum's subjective modernism on all denominations. Fuller went from tepid semi-inerrancy to rejection of inerrancy under the leadership of Barth/Kirschbaum students, who returned from Switzerland with new insights.
What do they promote? And what do they deplore? That is the answer.
