Critique of Sig Becker by LCMS-ELS Fave Tom Hardt

This photo and link from The Sausage Factory website
proves that Sig Becker is their expert on UOJ.

AC V has left a new comment on your post "UOJ Stormtroopers Remind Me of the Pro-Abortion Fo...":

No one at Steadfast Lutherans or LutherQuest evaluated the ramifications of the UOJ WELS Siegbert Becker taught, a UOJ that denied the efficacy of the means of grace, a UOJ that got the Krohn's disciplined in their WELS church. WELS pastors ought to review what they were taught by Becker. According to Steadfast Lutherans, the LC-MS rejects his formulation of UOJ. Below is the Becker UOJ as critiqued by the Swedes. For the complete reference see footnote 75 in the Hardt paper.

2) Absolution and the means of grace are downgraded to means of communication and deprived of their efficacy. S. Becker. op. cit., p. 55, interprets John 20:23: “they are remitted unto them” as a reference to what has already happened at Calvary, p. 56: “The meaning is this: ‘They have been forgiven completely in the past, and they still are forgiven now. This means that when we preach the message of the Gospel, we do not effect the remission of sins through our sermon.’” (tr. from Swedish).

3) Universal justification is said to be the contents of the sermon to be delivered to the heathen without any previous reference to the Law. This striking similarity to Huber’s pastoral advice to the Wittenberg theologians, quoted above in our article, is found in Becker, op. cit., p. 56 f. (tr. from Swedish): “In America it is very common that Reformed missionaries tell a man whom they try to gain: ‘Are you saved?’ … It is, however, not likely that a Lutheran missionary would ask: ‘Are you saved?’, as the experience of conversion is not so important from his theological point of view. As he believes in universal redemption and in universal justification it is more likely that he changes the order of the words and says: ‘You are saved,’ ‘Your sins are forgiven unto you.’ He can say so to everyone, as he knows that it is true about everyone.” Through the centuries Huber’s missionary sermon: “Habetis gratiam Dei” resounds in the 20th century.

Undoubtedly Söderlund’s fears concerning the theology introduced through Becker into Sweden seem reasonably justified.

UOJ Stormtroopers Remind Me of the Pro-Abortion Forces

Rolf Preus on LaughQuest:


I don’t know Rev. Rydecki. I do know most of the men associated with the Sabre of Boldness Award and they are orthodox Lutherans. I went to the Steadfast Lutherans website to find Rev. Rydecki’s comments. David Schumacher has correctly quoted him. It’s quite disappointing to read Rev. Rydecki’s comments. I certainly hope that the men who gave him this award will hasten to distance themselves from what he has said on this topic. The denial that God for Christ sake has forgiven the sins of the whole world is a very serious error. Friends don’t let friends deny objective justification without setting them straight! 

Reading through the debate on the Steadfast Lutherans website brings to mind the many times I have participated in a debate on this topic over the years and I think of the French proverb, “Plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose!”

What it really comes down to is the meaning of the gospel itself. To assert a universal redemption while denying a universal justification is to demonstrate a lack of understanding of the very nature of the gospel. I used to think that it was just that they didn’t understand words and did not understand that redemption entailed setting free and not merely paying the price to set free, that atonement entailed reconciliation, that reconciliation meant the cessation of God’s wrath, etc. But their problem is not primarily with misunderstanding the meaning of the specific soteriological terms – though it may begin there. It runs much deeper. They don’t understand the gospel. In their mind, the work of Christ hasn’t really achieved anything. Not really. Not so really that you can tell someone, “Son, be of good cheer, your sins are forgiven you.” But that's what Jesus said, and St. Matthew points out that God had given such power to men (plural) and not to Jesus alone.

Justification is for faith. That’s where the rubber hits the road. Objective justification is the assertion that faith has something real to grasp. To assert justification through faith alone while denying objective justification is to twist justification through faith into justification because of faith and once faith becomes the catalyst by which sins are forgiven fideism is given sanction and approval when it really ought to be exposed and rejected as the source of uncertainty.

***

GJ -
1. Read your father's book with discernment, Rolf.
2. Read P. Leyser's rebuke of Samuel Huber.
3. Take a deep, cleansing breath. Repent and retract.

Rolf Preus just condemned this repudiation of Samuel Huber.
He also imagines that Romans 4:24-25 absolves the world of sin.

---

KJV Romans 4:24 But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead; 25 Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.

PS - About the pro-abortion forces. They are going crazy over the fact that the Susan B. Komen Foundation is no longer funding Planned Parenthood to the tune of $700,000 a year. This charity bills itself as a fight against breast cancer, and abortion increases the risk of breast cancer.

Now the pro-abortion forces are attacking the Komen charity for no longer funding them, and all the pro-abortion people are chiming in. That only alerts people to fact of Planned Parenthood's abortion business and advocacy. I seldom write much about it on this blog because the readers are pro-life.

On Facebook I post many pro-life messages because babies need advocates too.

The UOJ Stormtroopers remind me of the pro-abortion lobbies because they pounce on every mention of justification by faith and vow to straighten out anyone who allows someone to voice what Luther taught, what the Book of Concord confessed, what the Scriptures clearly reveal.

Debate is good because the hidden agenda comes out into the daylight. Rolf Preus has stated on LaughQuest repeated that Romans 4:25 is the absolution of the world's sin. Nothing like that is revealed, and   his weak argument collapses completely with the inclusion of Romans 4:24 and the context of the two verses as the end of Romans 4, the transition to Romans 5 - justification by faith.

The Stormtroopers are like the abortionists because they use the logical fallacy of special pleading as their only method. There is only one side, theirs, and only one set of authorities to quote, theirs. Anyone else is a heretic.

On this blog and in my books I have no trouble quoting all their authorities and many more they have never read. I do this to let people study the sources and see for themselves. As soon as the Stormtroopers realize they are out-gunned and out-numbered, they turn incredibly nasty.

---

LPC has left a new comment on your post "UOJ Stormtroopers Remind Me of the Pro-Abortion Fo...":

Pr. Greg,

The perversion of this Preus descendant is astounding.

Here is what the test said

Matthew 9:2
And, behold, they brought to him a man sick of the palsy, lying on a bed: and Jesus seeing their faith said unto the sick of the palsy; Son, be of good cheer; thy sins be forgiven thee.

This Preus wants to declare to everyone be they have faith or not, "Be of good cheer, your sins are forgiven you".

This is universalism, and a perversion of the Sacred Text, a twisting of the Words of Jesus.

LPC

---

Brett Meyer has left a new comment on your post "UOJ Stormtroopers Remind Me of the Pro-Abortion Fo...":

Rolf Preus states, "They don’t understand the gospel. In their mind, the work of Christ hasn’t really achieved anything. Not really. Not so really that you can tell someone, “Son, be of good cheer, your sins are forgiven you." ...YOU ARE JUSTIFIED, RIGHTEOUS IN CHRIST AND ABSOLVED OF ALL SIN - AND YOU ARE CONDEMNED TO HELL FOR NOT BELIEVING IT.

I added the bolded parts as they fully express the teaching of UOJ.

That was a good discussion if only to allow them more rope. They certainly confessed all manner of false teachings which anyone willing to compare with the Lutheran Confessions and the Scripture passages presented can see for themselves. Even the rational thought used to subject Scripture to human reason was clearly shown.

An introduction to Swedish pietism « Churchmouse Campanologist

This is Augustana College's Old Main building,
above the Mississippi River  Valley.
I met Mrs. Ichabod on the first day of  classes.

An introduction to Swedish pietism « Churchmouse Campanologist:

"Yesterday’s post on Dwight Moody mentioned how popular his sermons and the hymns of his associate Ira D Sankey were with Swedish pietists.

Although neither visited Sweden, their influence, particularly between 1875 and 1880 during a time called ‘Moody Fever’, is still acknowledged today, as we’ll see.

A group of Swedish pietists in the United States publish a journal called Pietisten (Pietist), based in Minneapolis (emphases mine):"

***

My German professor created this watercolor of the Denkmann Library, where I worked,
with Old Main in the background.

GJ - The Swedish Augustana Synod was a major component of the Lutheran Church in America merger in 1962, with about 400,000 members. The group began as a Pietistic migration to America but changed course  under various influences, including Passavant.

My mother was the first in her family to graduate from college.
Her four children earned 12 academic degrees and two CPA designations.

I worked at the Augustana library and helped archive ancient, dusty bound volumes of Pietisten. I never realized I would write my dissertation about a man who taught on that campus, who was probably my mother's undergraduate professor. A. D. Mattson also went to Yale Divinity School.

Mrs. Ichabod lived at Andreen, a dorm named after a full professor at Yale who left an established academic career to bring this little college out of insolvency. Andreen's daughter was friends with my mother, through the education system.

'via Blog this'

This Medieval monastery is actually an outside hallway on Zion Hill,
where Augustana Seminary was located, next to the college.
The seminary merged to form Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago,
during the time we were undergraduates.
The seminary became the science center.

PS - There is a fake Augustana College, just as there is a fake Ichabog. Success breeds envy and copy-cats. The fake Augustana is a college in Sioux Falls. If you look up Augustana in Google images, it may take you to the fake school. Do not be fooled.

Rupert Murdoch Has Discovered UOJ in the Bible: How Can WELS Resist?

Old NIV Romans ²² This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, ²³ for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, ²⁴ and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.




^{New NIV Romans 22} This righteousness is given through faith in^[h] Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, ²³ for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, ²⁴ and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. 


***


GJ - Just add an all, and WELS will pounce on it like a hobo on a hotdog.

---


AC V has left a new comment on your post "Rupert Murdoch Has Discovered UOJ in the Bible: Ho...":


Case in point:


Translation Evaluation Committee - Supplemental Report for the 2011 WELS Convention


In some passages of great theological significance, a significant improvement can genuinely assist the reader in grasping the truth of God’s Word. Similarly, a significant weakening can obscure what our God would have us know. Among the former, we might point to Romans 3:23-24, so crucial to our understanding of justification:


NIV84 Ro 3:23-24 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.


New NIV Ro 3:23-24 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.


The addition of the little word “all” is significant, since it clarifies Paul’s intended meaning: God has declared all guilty sinners not guilty by his gracious, saving work in Christ Jesus.


http://www.wels.net/sites/wels/files/BORAM2011_supplemental_translationevaluationcommittee.pdf


(lines 167-173)

Do not refer to Murdoch when talking about the NNIV.
WELS orders.
He owns it  - the NNIV.
Thrivent owns WELS...and Missouri.

***

GJ - Does SP Mark Schroeder agree with TEC? He is supposed to be a theologian. WELS members and pastors should do some research on the man behind these inventive translations - Nida.


Here is an interesting post I just found on the issue.

Emergent - Channeling Groeschel with Screens and a Pit Band

Ski does Groeschel, which Paul Calvin Kelm calls "creative."
The photo is better than a thousand-word post.

Ski needs some ab workouts with Joel Osteen,
who teaches the same doctrine.

---

AC V has left a new comment on your post "Emergent - Channeling Groeschel with Screens and a...":

Ski is so '80s! Those jeans went out of style long ago. If he's trying to be relevant, he's failing miserably. 

Craig Groeschel is on the right.
He encourages people to borrow his "sermons" verbatim,
but insists they give him credit.
Glende denied doing this.

***

GJ - Oh! Oh! I just discovered a new Church Growth principle. Get jeans from the Salvation Army - the ones they can't give away. Market them as Groeschel Genes (tm). If you want an empire like his, wear the same clothes, preach the exact same sermons. Download his graphics. Copy his fill-in-the-blanks bulletin copy.


If it is silly enough, stupid enough, and crooked enough, your DP will back you and stomp the opposition for you.

Why Do UOJ Zombies Continue To Fool Themselves?

Tim Glende does not find this funny,
because it is not scatological and abusive.

Nothing is quite so puzzling as Lutherans constantly at war against faith, especially justification by faith.


The LCMS is no longer a UOJ shop, but WELS and the Little Sect on the Prairie have a dictatorial grip on the topic. Very few laity are bewitched by UOJ or even know about it. The Scriptures, liturgy, and hymns do not teach a magical absolution of the world, so trying to insert that language is a trial for the language-impaired. The New NIV will fix that, which is the #1 reason for WELS promoting it.


Here are some reasons why some remain UOJ zombies. I trace it to assumptions:

1. "Walther was never wrong about anything." Many synodical fans are reduced to making all the doctrinal opinions and historical facts fit this assumption. Walther taught UOJ, so anyone questioning that new doctrine is a heretic.
2. "Faith is bad. Faith is a work of man." This one comes from the Calvinists arguing with Arminians, who did teach that faith was a virtue. At least the Calvinists saw it that way. Therefore, the UOJ Stormtroopers are working from a Calvinist perspective.
3. "Atonement and justification are the same thing." This was a popular perspective in the 19th century, due to the nature of Lutheran-Reformed union churches and Pietism degenerating into rationalism. Double-justification means that first the entire world is absolved (even back to Adam, I suppose) for Part One, and individuals have to agree with that for Part Two. Because this is so anti-Biblical and Enthusiastic, not to mention rationalistic, Part Two simply drops out. Voila - mainline Protestantism today.
4. "Holy Mother Synod is infallible." No one will admit that Romanist takeaway, but this attitude is a synodical given, even in the tawdry cesspools of the CLC (sic). Swap man-boy rape videos with other perverts - the Synod President will announce your forgiveness to the world. Question UOJ - you will be given the Left Foot of Fellowship.
   



5. "That's Uncle Fritz you are talking about." Everyone has an Uncle Fritz in the synod. Because Walther put his stamp on everything, many were trained in his errors, since Ferdinand was the man to decode the Bible, the Book of Concord, and Luther. Questioning someone's uncle is regarded as worse than shooting Bambi's mother, so few will touch the topic in the open.
6. "You are next." The Stormtroopers love to beat people up in public while calling themselves confessional Lutherans. Few want to be singled out and some assume that people with no manners and no ethics must be orthodox.

Fired Mars Hill Church Elder Breaks Silence : MATTHEW PAUL TURNER ✪ Believing.Doubting.Writing.Parenting.Laughing.Thinking.Creating.Hoping.Living.

Mark Driscoll is known as the cussing minister.

Fired Mars Hill Church Elder Breaks Silence : MATTHEW PAUL TURNER ✪ Believing.Doubting.Writing.Parenting.Laughing.Thinking.Creating.Hoping.Living.:

Tim Glende told his congregation they were going to a "pastor conference,"
but there was no WELS or ELS conference at the time
the trio went to Seattle and took this photo (minus Mark).

FIRED MARS HILL CHURCH ELDER BREAKS SILENCE

Posted by Matthew on Tuesday, January 31, 2012 · 42 Comments 

Bent Meyer was fired by Mark Driscoll and Mars Hill Church in 2007. He spoke up on Sunday here. Bent’s backstory is offered here.

It’s not a long comment, but what he says is quite eye-opening and telling about the intentional narrow ministry mindedness of Mark.

I hope more people like Bent will speak up. Their stories are priceless to those who are suffering Mark’s consequences now.

I’ve heard from two Seattle journalists over the last couple days. Both said that former Mars Hill members are coming out of the wordwork to share their abuse stories.

It’s sad. And it keeps getting sadder.

I am one of the men fired the day of Mark’s rant about two elders he felt needed broken noses. Someone asked what has happened since that day.
I am happy to say, the next Sunday my wife and I attended another Church with far better expository teaching and a community that authentically and generously helps the marginalized.

I also finished my master program and have a private mental health practice serving the Seattle and Eastside area. This was a very good and satisfying result.

Regarding whether I spoke up or not. I have not been silenced by any direct or implied threats of retaliation. It is clear that the one who possess the air waves controls the content and spin of a story, so there was not much to be done.

I thought a lot about how I would response and just what my motives would be. I chose not to be lured into a public argument through the Seattle Times asking me for a blow by blow description of the events I have documented. I have a tendency to keep material for years and years.

I did prepare my narrative, including supporting documents, for members only to read who came to me for explanation. They had to agree never to disclose any of it to the media. These people have been honorable. As best I know, none have. By doing this I opened up myself to their scrutiny and possible rebuke. I have received nothing but kindness and support.

As to my motives, I want Mark’s best. In my opinion he is a very troubled man. He is caught in his own hell. The consequence, of course, is the influence he has on others, which is mixed.

He, Lief Moi, and Mike Gunn, together the founders of Mars Hill Church, sent out to focus on those that were young, upwardly mobile and future leaders. They wanted to position themselves to influence their faith decisions and their life choices. This is a lesson for many church leaders to learn from and choose for themselves.

The downside is Mark’s pathology shows up in ways that are impulsive, aggressive, irascible, shut off from effective relational influence, and most apparent not respectful and submissive to anyone, though he claims otherwise.

I have hoped and still hope for something short of him destroying himself that would bring about substantial change for this ever increasing population of worshiper. Some have fretted there will be a great loss of Christians with the demise of Mark and/or the Church. I don’t think so. The church that comprises all of us will survive. The chaff will be blown away, but the church will remain.

I would speak a caution to all of us. There is much to be learn for the Mars Hill phenomena. Don’t dismiss the hunger and openness to be influenced represented in those ages 18 through 30. Invent content that is useful and distribute it freely on the web. Always incorporate creatively some explanation of the gospel at the end of every teaching session with an invitation to do business with Jesus.

Even though Mark’s portrayal of masculinity is more like a comic book superhero and women needing to be protected and rescued is his focus, young men coming into manhood is richly important. Absent fathers is epidemic. Think about what it is that has caused them not to attach to their families. Mark comes at it from the standpoint of duty and responsibility, which is mechanical, missing other primary questions. Why do so many men not attach to their families? Why do they abandon family so easily? Mark uses shame and intimidation as the means of gaining compliance, which has the appearance of working, but is not transformational in the long run, or creates other issues of abusive relationships related to power and control. In many men, the tendency is understood in the short saying, “Monkey see monkey do.” Don’t over react, young men need to mature.

I feel like I need to give attention to the needs of women with equal if not more space since women are marginalized and silenced in so many ways. But, I will leave that for another time.

I hope this will satisfy the primary curiosity of those who wonder what has happened to me. I will say, the other elder fired at the same times is a good friend and is doing well.

Thankful that Bent shared.

I found this here.

 ieatschwaemerei (http://ieatschwaemerei.myopenid.com/) has left a new comment on your post "Investigating Universal Objective Justification":

This article will be interesting to you: http://matthewpaulturner.net/jesus-needs-new-pr/fired-mars-hill-church-elder-breaks-silence/

'via Blog this'

VirtueOnline - News - Exclusives - Presiding Bishop and HOD President Face off over TEC Budget

This an allegory for Jefferts-Schori's leadership.

VirtueOnline - News - Exclusives - Presiding Bishop and HOD President Face off over TEC Budget:


Presiding Bishop and HOD President Face off over TEC Budget
Litigation costs are forcing church's hand in how it will spend money now and in the future

By David W. Virtue
www.virtueonline.org
January 31, 2012

A power struggle and simmering rivalry which has been going on for a number of years between Presiding Bishop Jefferts Schori and House of Deputies president Bonnie Anderson erupted this past week when the Executive Council of The Episcopal Church met in Maryland where the two parties offered different visions of the mission of the church.

Executive Council received two different budget proposals from its Executive Committee with one setting the diocesan asking at the current level of 19 percent, and requiring cuts of almost $6 million from the $140 million 2010-2012 budget adopted by the General Convention. This is the position favored by PB Jefferts Schori.

The other lowers the diocesan asking to 15 percent and requires cuts of almost $21 million from the current budget. HOD President Anderson favors the 15 percent asking.

Both budgets were ultimately scuttled and a third budget was sent to Program, Budget & Finance.

"We have created something different and unique. There are increased funds for justice ministry in this budget that we will present to PB&F," Said Jefferts Schori at a press conference.

Anderson ripped the national church's current spending habits, "Let's reduce the amount that we ask dioceses to send to the Church Center. Let's study the best use of the building at 815 Second Avenue with an eye to freeing up for mission the $7.7 million dollars that is earmarked for facilities cost and debt repayment during the next triennium. Let's expect that dioceses and their networks know best how to build up God's church and support ministry where it is most effective. And as we change the budget, let's acknowledge that we also need to change our models of accountability and responsibility to be mutual and respectful of the entire people of God, not just those with ecclesial power."

VOL reporter Mary Ann Mueller confronted the Presiding Bishop with this charge at a press conference following to which Jefferts Schori retorted, "I believe that all members of The Episcopal Church have ecclesial power meant to be used in service of God's mission."

Bishop and Mrs. Robinson.
He divorced his wife.

Behind Anderson's charges are the horrendous millions of dollars being spent on lawsuits to reclaim churches that have fled TEC's grip. TEC mortgaged 815 2nd Ave., for $60 million to continue the lawsuits and now must earmark millions for repayments. The reason for all this goes back to the consecration of the libidinous homosexual Bishop of New Hampshire Gene Robinson whose behavior brought about the tear in the Episcopal Church resulting in the formation of the Anglican Church in North America. Sin has consequences and it is catching up with The Episcopal Church big time. Aspects of mission are being downgraded for payments that MUST be made. Banks offer no mercy.

Chief Operating Office Bishop Stacy Sauls commented, "This meeting, as you might imagine, is the source of no small amount of anxiety for the staff as we consider the budget... Managers and team leaders are engaged in conversations about how to take whatever budget comes from General Convention and dream, create, adapt, and act. But I do ask you to be sensitive to their legitimate needs in this time."

He also asked for "a serious discussion of far-reaching structural reform leaving nothing off the table and no question unasked."

INTERPRETATION: The money is not coming in to cover all the crazy stuff TEC wants to pass and sponsor which the world and most of the laity in the Episcopal Church ignore. Canon lawyer A. S. Haley noted those challenges calling them "significant and substantial."

Kirk Hadaway, the church official in charge of congregational research, and Matthew Price of the Church Pension Fund raised the alarm saying that 72% of Episcopal congregations were in financial stress as of 2010 (compared to 58% of other denominations for the same year) -- the highest level in the past decade, by far... The question is how long will it be before the other 28% succumb and find they can barely raise enough funds to keep the doors open and salaries paid.

In order to get her way, Jefferts Schori blindsided the HOD president by going directly to the House of Deputies through the House of Bishops with a video of her plans and her take on the budget.

This so incensed Anderson that she fired back a public letter in which she said that the Office of Communications email sent to all the bishops had mischaracterized her response to the video's release and asked the bishops to forward the video message to their diocese's deputies.

She noted angrily, "In my nearly 25 years as a deputy, I don't ever recall the Presiding Bishop speaking directly to the House of Deputies outside of a joint session or without giving the House due notice, while at General Convention. I don't ever recall a Presiding Bishop corresponding directly with deputies outside of the General Convention, without the knowledge of, or in collaboration with the President.

"I was surprised because I thought that the Presiding Bishop, her staff, and I had worked through some important issues of internal communications last fall. I had talked with both Bishop Sauls and the Presiding Bishop and asked that we proceed in a more collegial and cooperative manner. I thought we had agreed to do so.

"But while the General Convention Office was holding the video, it was released by the Office of Communications to the whole church just hours before the Presiding Bishop and I were scheduled to arrive in Baltimore where we could have resolved the situation in person.

"I told her that I am concerned about the use of church wide resources to lobby General Convention on only one side of a legislative issue.

"Despite this productive conversation, upon direction from the Presiding Bishop, the Office of Communications sent the second email, this time to bishops, that mischaracterized my request that the video be held, thus putting me in a difficult position and making it necessary to spell all of this out."

Canon lawyer and former Eau Claire bishop William Wantland told VOL that Jefferts Schori's actions were "sneaky but legal." There is no limitation on a Diocesan Bishop speaking to the Diocesan Deputies, he said.

In the end money, or the lack of it, will determine the course of action TEC will take. The two women, who both share a liberal theological worldview will find that whatever they decide, events will overtake them and determine the course of TEC's long spiral downward.

END


'via Blog this'

Dwight Moody: the evangelist who nearly wasn’t « Churchmouse Campanologist

Dwight Moody: the evangelist who nearly wasn’t « Churchmouse Campanologist:

"Moody’s visits to the UK made news in Sweden. Swedish pietists invited him to travel there but he never did. Nonetheless, the Swedish Mission Friends looked forward to reading his sermons and sang Sankey’s hymns. Swedes who emigrated to Chicago attended Moody’s church."

'via Blog this'

GJ - I highly recommend this series. Moody was very important. I grew up listening to WDLM radio from Chicago, a city with a large Swedish population.

Augustana began as a Pietistic mission, but became confessional, as the name suggests. I look forward to future installments.

All Time Favorite Post Is...Drumroll

Tim Glende loved this photo so much that it remained his Facebook profile picture for a long time.
That is not his wife or daughter, but Katy Perry, the ex-wife of Russell Brand.
Tim wrote so many anonymous comments on this blog that I began
to call him A. Nony Mouse.
Tim began a blog with that name, but erased it.

The all-time favorite post, since June of 2010, is...


The Rev. A. Nony Mouse Hates These Sayings But Loves To Plagiarize Groeschel.


5,224 views so far. But nobody reads this blog.


What did the toxic but anonymous bully complain about in the latest fake blog eructation?


Quotations! He hates those collections of quotations.


He probably hates how appropriate they are, how the Word of God condemns his life, his false doctrine, his slaughter of the sheep.

One of Tim's Boys: Engaging, Articulate, Well-Informed, A Gentleman to The CORE

Mequon graduates provide medical opinions,
before anyone asks for one.
Their wives help out, too.

Anonymous said... I was thinking about it the other day and following the UOJ debate over at that Steadfast Lutheran blog: Does anyone think Jackson might have an undiagnosed form of autism? Aspergers perhaps? My wife works with kids like that in special ed. program in south Milwaukee and he seems to display a lot of the characteristics. For one thing, he has a hard time interacting with people on an emotional level. His humor is stuff that only he thinks is funny. I often times go his page and look at all his odd photo-shop stuff and think "I don't get it. Is this supposed to be funny? I mean, I can't even figure out what he's trying to portray here." It would also explain his relationship with his parishners. He seems to have never figured out that they uniformly disliked him. Secondly, people with Aspergers typically can't understand written works on an intuitive level. They are really good at memorizing facts, but they don't see the big picture. Case-in-point: Jackson builds up great deposits of quotes in his posts, but he doesn't really understands how to interpret them. I mean, looking at his "scholarship," I get why he could get into Notre Dame but then took 15 years to graduate. He can memorize facts, but he has no comprehension of how they work together or even that different words have nuance and can mean different things in different contexts. He probably aced the GRE, but then couldn't comprehend most of the course material. He's told some stories about his relationship with Yoder that seem to hint at that. Anyways, just an idea. Aspergers in a person of his generation would probably not have been diagnosed so it sort of makes sense.


***


GJ - A typical WELS tactic is to start with  falsehoods and spin tales from that. A little research would turn up my basic bio, which means I finished college, seminary, and a master's at Yale in 7 years, a PhD program at Notre Dame in 7 years. If you add an MA in education, 15 years would be the time involved in earning six degrees rather than one. That by itself would show the Glende pal (or Glende himself) to be an ignorant, hate-filled misanthrope. My diagnosis is - alcoholism, addiction to porn, and extreme laziness.


Northwestern Publishing House wants me to review their books, so WELS must think I can read and comprehend theological content. I wonder if the writer has ever been asked to review a book from a publisher. Has he ever written a book or essay? Has he ever signed his name to a comment?


Northwestern Publishing House also sells Catholic, Lutheran, Protestant. That meant studying the doctrine of Roman Catholicism, Lutheran orthodoxy, and Protestantism while providing a useful guide for all three. WELS sold cartons of the books years ago, and the book continues to sell. I am surprised that so many genius-level Mequon graduates never wrote anything like it. Glende's Uncle Brug recommended it to his classes, the last I heard.


At one point all the doctrinal books at NPH were written by non-WELS authors. How does one explain that fact to us supposed Asperger patients?


We have trouble relating to Lutheran pastors who copy Groeschel sermons verbatim, not comprehending that they have left the Lutheran Church by doing so.


The latest comment on Glende's anonymous blog simply means that the Time of Wrath/Church and Chicanery forces are feeling the hurt from being exposed. More people are questioning their honesty, morality, decency, and doctrine. 


The Hochmuth scandal, which Glende wants to cover up with PR, is just the tip of septic tank in WELS. Ask an insider. I have.

Jack Kilcrease, Paul McCain, and Rolf Preus: Anti-Means of Grace Triple Threat

Two years in the parish and he still calls
himself a pastor - just like Walther.

Comment Link: http://steadfastlutherans.org/?p=4190#comment-279717
Author: Rev. Paul T. McCain
Comment:
I see that the Jackson disciples have been hard at work here spreading the Gospel according to Jackson.


People should know that Greg Jackson is a false teacher. He was, at one point, a Lutheran pastor, but he is no longer. He was expelled from several Lutheran church bodies. [GJ - Note his lies about working with Herman Otten. Same old liar - Paul McCain. He was already in legal trouble in the 1990s with Larry Darby for trashing Larry, one of the more generous donors to his alma mater, Concordia Seminary, Ft. Wayne.]


He now claims to have a "church" on the Internet, providing "worship services" and even communion, via  streaming video on the Internet, from a spare bedroom in his house. Meyer and Cruz are two of his "members" ... things are so bad that Jackson even coaches these people to hold elements up to the computer screen while he "consecrates" them. [GJ - Another delusion from McCain. He was recently forced to apologize to Norman Teigen for the vicious lies published on his crypto-Roman blog. He also said the congregation was named after my dead daughter, another false assertion. Why was this charmer banned from the ALPB's online forum?]


The best advice anyone could give to people who may be tempted to engage in conversation with Jackson or his small group of fanatic disciples is simply this: Mark and avoid them. Jackson and his followers are wolves in sheep's clothing, deceived and deceiving others.


We should have nothing to do with them, other than to rebuke them sharply and warn others.


I believe that the BJS site is doing no good service in providing a platform for these deniers of the Biblical and Lutheran doctrine of justification.

---

Jack Kilcrease, Roman Catholic employee,
is Paul McCain's expert on UOJ.

Carl Vehse strikes me as having a similar attitude.
Vehse knew all about Bishop Stephan's adultery,
like the Walther brothers and the rest of the Saxon Pietists.
Syphillis was the deal-breaker.

Dr. Jack Kilcrease has left a new comment on your post "Investigating Universal Objective Justification":


You write:


"Jack Kilcrease--trained by ELCA, employed by Roman Catholics to teach religion to papists--gave away his profound ignorance of Lutheran theology by his repeated references to "the doctrine of Objective Justification." David Scaer and Paul McCain think he is the bomb. The Lutheran Reformers avoided such terminology as "the doctrine of..." There is only one doctrine, a unified truth - in harmony with the entire witness of the Sacred Scriptures. Writing about "doctrines" in the plural suggests a modular view of Christianity, where some units can be changed, others dropped, and still others added."


SD V states:
"These two doctrines, we believe and confess, should ever and ever be diligently inculcated in the Church of God even to the end of the world"


Interesting how they use the word "doctrine" to describe separate articles of the faith (law and gospel).


What about Ep Rule and Norm section?:


"To this direction, as above announced, all doctrines are to be conformed, and what is, contrary thereto is to be rejected and condemned, as opposed to the unanimous declaration of our faith."


Again, interesting how here the body of doctrine is call (sic) "doctrines." Very interesting indeed. 

***

GJ - "To avoid" is not synonymous with "to never use." Poor Jack is so busy dazzling McCain and Scaer than he has lost his grip on the English language. Like the others, Kilcrease constantly makes a fool of himself by constantly going back to the absolution of the world, which is not taught in the Scriptures, never affirmed in the Book of Concord, and never taught with seriousness before Halle University's rancid Pietism began to take effect.

The double-justification language of OJ and SJ, lovingly stroked by the trio, is from the Calvinist Woods translation of the rationalist-Pietist Knapp's textbook.  Walther later approved of the language and F. Pieper canonized it. 

---

OJ trembled on Melanchthon's lips,
Rolf would have us believe.
No, this confesses exactly what Robert Preus wrote in
Justification and Rome.

LaughQuest has this gem from Rolf Preus:

As AC IV makes clear, the faith through which we are justified is the faith that believes that Christ suffered for us and that for his sake our sin is forgiven and righteousness and eternal life are given to us. To believe that for Christ's sake our sin is forgiven is to believe in objective justification. 

“I haven’t seen a clear Scripture passage that states that God ever absolved the world of sin, or that the sins of the world have been remitted – although they have certainly all been paid for!” 

Romans 4, 25 clearly teaches that God absolved the world of sin.

***

GJ - Romans 4 is a chapter on Abraham as the father of faith, climaxing with believers being justified by faith. World absolution is definitely not taught in Romans 4 or 5.

---

Author: Dr. Jack Kilcrease

http://steadfastlutherans.org/?p=4190#comment-279752
Comment:
<a href="#comment-279742" rel="nofollow">@Jim Pierce  #225 </a>


Apt analogy with the oneness penecostals.  I've had the same experience.


I think everyone can see why I warned against engaging with the Jackson sect.  Discussions and debates with them are highly fruitless since they simply endlessly accuse one of holding positions that they do not.

---

Comment Link: http://steadfastlutherans.org/?p=4190#comment-279771
Author: Rev. Paul T. McCain
Comment:
Jack, you are entirely correct. Engagement is futile. There is such a thing as invincible ignorance and Jackson and his disciples are prime examples of it.

---

Gibbon - "They fought without discipline and ran without shame."


---


Dr. Jack Kilcrease has left a new comment on your post "Jack Kilcrease, Paul McCain, and Rolf Preus: Anti-...":


Actually, I believe it is you who has missed the point. I am aware the the term "avoid" need not mean "never." The point is that you haven't provided any evidence that the Reformers, Confessors, or the Lutheran scholastics "avoided" the use of doctrine as a pural or talk of individual doctrines. My use of the Formula of Concord was intentional: If it was their MO to "avoid" such a practice (as you assert), they would have tried not to use such terminology in central confessonal document. But of course they show no such aversion and very casually use the term "doctrine" for individual articles of the faith. Certainly they want to define doctrine as a coherence body (corpus doctrina), but that does not mean that they avoided talk of individual articles of the faith as doctrines.


Actually, if you've read Preus or Richard Muller's scholarship on the period of Reformed and Lutheran scholasticism, you would know that the loci-method actually tended to isolate individual doctrines within given treatises designated as "common places." As Preus and Muller note, the development of each doctine is self-contained. This would suggest that both Lutherans and Reformed folks often thought of and developed individual doctrines on their own, even if they thought the the given doctrine had a larger meaning within the corpus doctrina. Hence, the arrangment of these doctrines within larger systematic theologies of the period tends to be arbitrary. For this reason, I do not think you have much of a basis for making your claim.


Now, I know you probably won't publish this. But I thought that I would clarify my point any way.


I wish you all the best and that God may bless you in spite of your theological errors.


***


GJ - Jack, you need an account on LaughQuest. You would no longer feel like an outcast. Maybe McCain can recommend you - while denying that he did.


---

"Enjoy our nuanced blend of Evolution and creation,
Roman liturgy and Arminian content,
on sale now at CPH."

bruce-church (http://bruce-church.myopenid.com/) has left a new comment on your post "Jack Kilcrease, Paul McCain, and Rolf Preus: Anti-...":

Now that UOJ and McCain's evolution pandering to kids has been outed, he says everyone ought to mark and avoid the Ichablog. It's rather like the mafia telling people not to talk to the FBI and cops so they can get back to their business as normal, taking in money from people who think they are orthodox Lutherans.

David R. Barnhart: Komen Drops Funding for Planned Parenthood

David R. Barnhart: Komen Drops Funding for Planned Parenthood:

"Abiding Word Ministries has previously reported Susan G Komen's support for Planned Parenthood.
Therefore we are pleased to report that funding has stopped.

http://www.thechurchreport.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=siteContent.default&objectID=148289"

'via Blog this'

Investigating Universal Objective Justification

Comment Link: http://steadfastlutherans.org/?p=4190#comment-279655
Author: Joe Krohn

Comment:


In January of 2011, a WELS pastor preached that our sins were forgiven before we were born; before we heard the Word of God; before our Baptisms.  He stated during discussions that before we do anything, God has forgiven us.  We challenged this teaching.  We received many of the same ruinations that are prevalent here in defense of UOJ.  So you see this is a big problem.  It will eventually go one of two ways.  Either it will morph into full fledged universalism, or go back to the way Scripture and the Confessions speak of one Justification (the promise of forgiveness) that comes through faith, by Grace for Christ’s sake; as it has been since the fall of man in the garden.


The key to understanding justification is where the righteousness of Christ resides and how it is distributed.  It is on Christ objectively FOR (not on) the world and becomes OURS (imputation) through faith by a hearing of the Word of God by the power of the Holy Spirit.


BTW…we were excommunicated for our confession and told we were in need of repentance.  When we asked what commandment we broke, we were given no answer and told it was a fellowship issue.  Excommunication is reserved for the unwillingness to repent for breaking the Law of God…the Ten Commandments.

***

GJ - The Unsteady Lutheran Enthusiasts ended up with a good discussion on their hands, because a wide variety defended the historical Christian faith instead of bowing to the UOJ bullies.


Jack Kilcrease--trained by ELCA,  employed by Roman Catholics to teach religion to papists--gave away his profound ignorance of Lutheran theology by his repeated references to "the doctrine of Objective Justification." David Scaer and Paul McCain think he is the bomb.


The Lutheran Reformers avoided such terminology as "the doctrine of..." There is only one doctrine, a unified truth - in harmony with the entire witness of the Sacred Scriptures. Writing about "doctrines" in the plural suggests a modular view of Christianity, where some units can be changed, others dropped, and still others added.


That is exactly what happened in the aftermath of the Reformation. Calvinist influence merged the atonement with justification, first with Samuel Huber, who was rebuked and sent packing. Huber would be a Synod President today in the LCMS, WELS, or ELS.


The second wave of Calvinism came in the form of Spener's union efforts. The merging of atonement and justification came in the form of double justification, first taught by Georg Christian Knapp and later by F. Schleiermacher. Knapp, Schleiermacher, and Tholuck (Hoenecke's mentor)--all three at Halle--were pivotal figures in Protestant theology.

Ottomar Fuerbringer, Father of 
Ludwig Fuerbringer, Father of
Fibby
Missouri Lutherans know how significant the Fuerbringer family was. Ottomar came over with the syphilitic bishop and married the widow of C. F. W. Walther's brother. Ludwig Fuerbringer was born of that union, became the senior pastor at Frankenmuth, after his father, and later professor and president of Concordia Seminary, St. Louis. Ludwig's son Fibby was the president of the seminary who turned the campus over to the liberals, leading to Tietjen and Seminex (the first gay Lutheran seminary, chaired by Jungkuntz, from WELS).


Ottomar Fuerbringer was trained as a pastor but could not get a call in Europe because he was a Pietist. The Lutheran Church in the German states was rationalistic, with little or no tolerance for "Pietists and mystics," the disparaging terms used for believers. "Old Lutheran" is a term used in America for those who rejected the extremes of revivalism - no liturgy, no creeds, transforming people's lives with the Law.


The "Old Lutherans" were not orthodox - they were cell group Pietists who kept the worship forms of the Lutheran Church while adopting the fantasy that the cell groups were the real church.


Pietism is unionism, which draws people away from Lutheran doctrine, so anyone in a cell group church is headed out of the Lutheran fold, even though the individual may remain a Lutheran in name only.


Doctrinal indifference and disparaging the Means of Grace will always lead to Unitarian-Universalism or to Pentecostalism. Many WELS pastors have gone charismatic (ironic, eh?) while others like Jungkuntz and Gerke have gone Unitarian-Universalist.