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| Lenski's commentaries are still circulating - ELCA owns them now. |
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| Lenski was silenced on inerrancy, and Capital Seminary went down the drain. |
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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 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 National Council of Churches.
Friday, September 8, 2023
Often Mentioned, Seldom Seen - Eisenach/Lenski Selections
A Reader Comments on the Poke, Poke a Rib Song at a Lutheran Church, Aiming at Children's Sunday/Funday
Hello Pastor Jackson
I would like to comment on your September 7 blog post in which you presented the video of a Lutheran congregation singing “Hal la la la la lu ia” as part of their Divine Service.
I followed the link to YouTube and watched the video there. My first thought was that this must be an ELCA congregation. I checked the church's website and found that it belongs to “Lutheran Congregations in Mission for Christ” (LCMC). According to Wikipedia:
Lutheran Congregations in Mission for Christ (LCMC) is an association of Lutheran congregations located primarily in the United States. ... It began in 2001 in response to some liberal views of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). ... The group describes itself as "centrist" or "mainstream", noting that it stands between the more liberal ELCA and the more conservative Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod (LCMS) ...
So they see themselves as centrist, mainstream Lutherans.
Most of the congregants in the video appeared to be aged 50+, some looked to be in their sixties or seventies. I didn't see any children or teenagers. I was struck by the fact that these mature/senior citizen Lutherans were OK with standing up and singing a silly kindergarten song as part of a Divine Service.
A few weeks ago, you posted the video of an ELCA congregation reciting the “Sparkle Creed”. Most of the congregants there also appeared to be mature/senior citizens. Therefore they were catechized in the late 1960's and the 1970's, long before the rot had set in that we see in the ELCA today. Nonetheless, these Lutherans were OK with reciting the theological gobbledygook of the “Sparkle Creed” as part of a Divine Service.
It appears that the theological underpinnings of many American Lutherans is a mile wide and an inch deep.
This is pure ELCA, from their Edina, MN congregation.
I Fired Schwan's aka Yelloh
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Marvin Schwan put ice cream on wheels and his name on various Lutheran buildings. The synods were always in fellowship with each other when it came to Schwan Foundation funds. I was cutting down on Schwan foods, ok, ice cream and pizza, when they changed to Yelloh for some mysterious reason. One of the drivers stopped by when I was in a hurry, so I asked for their "skillets" and a gallon of ice cream for guests: 3 skillets and a gallon of chocolate ice cream. I did not bother with the total so I saw the email later - $83.13! That was so far off its value that I phoned to cancel. I wonder how far corporations will go with combining low quality and high costs: there must be a breaking point. I fixed a vegetable stew with meat to retaliate:
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One reason fad diets fail is the idiosyncratic ingredients. Each named diet has special requirements, and that is probably the #1 reason they fail.
My vegetable consultant suggested more meat in my meals, and he was right. Going light on meat built up a big craving for the high value fats and salt.
Nine of the ingredients listed above have been given high marks for nutrition. Too much healthy food habits will turn that furtive stop at McDonalds into a disaster.
Daily Luther Sermon Quote - Trinity 14 - "Not that faith is in man and does not work, which is impossible. For faith is a living, active thing."
Link -> Complete Sermon for Trinity 14.
18. Now we must also examine the other part of this example of the nature of Christianity, love. The lepers have instructed us how to believe; Christ teaches us to love. Love does to our neighbor as it sees Christ has done to us, as he says in John 13:15: “For I have given you an example, that ye also should do as I have done to you.” And immediately afterwards he says in verse 34: “A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another; even as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.”
What else does this mean than to say: Through me in faith you now have everything that I am and have: I am your own, you are now rich and satisfied through me; for all I do and love I do and love not for my but only for your sake, and I only think how to be useful and helpful to you, and accomplish whatever you need and should have. Therefore consider this example, to do to each other as I have done to you, and only consider how to be useful to your neighbor, and do what is useful and necessary for him.
Your faith has enough in my love and grace; so your love shall also give enough to others.
19. Behold, this is a Christian life, and in brief it does not need much doctrine nor many books, it is wholly contained in faith and love. Thus also says St. Paul, Galatians 6:2: “Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the Law of Christ.” And to the Philippians 2:4 he says: “Not looking each of you to his own things, but each of you also to the things of others.” And there he gives us Christ as an example, 5:6: “Who existing in the form of God, counted not the being on an equality with God a thing to be grasped.” Who, although he was true God, yet became our servant and served us, and died a scandalous death for us. This Christian, free and joyful life has the evil spirit as its enemy, who with nothing else does such great injury as with the doctrines of men, as we shall hear. For truly the manner of a Christian’s life is briefly marked out in the words, have a good heart toward God and a good will toward your fellow man, here it consists entirely within us.
20. His good heart and faith naturally teach him how to pray. Yea, what is such faith, but pure prayer? It continually looks for divine grace, and if it looks for it, it also desires it with all the heart. And this desire is really the true prayer, that Christ teaches and God requires, which also obtains and accomplishes all things. And because it does not trust or seek comfort in self, its works or worthiness, but builds upon God’s pure grace, therefore whatever he believes, desires, hopes and prays, also comes to pass; so that the holy Prophet Zechariah justly calls the Spirit a Spirit of grace and of prayer, where God says, Zechariah 12:10: “And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace and supplication.” Because faith recognizes and desires God’s favor without any intermission.
21. Again, love naturally teaches him how to do good works. For they alone are good works which serve your neighbor and are good. Yea, what is such love but only good deeds continually shown toward your neighbor, so that our work is called love, our faith is called prayer? Thus Christ speaks in John 15:12-13: “This is my commandment, that ye love one another, even as I have loved you. Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” As though he would say: So completely have I done all my works for your benefit, that I also gave my life for you, which is the greatest of all love, that is, the greatest work of love. If I had known a greater love, I would have manifested it to and for you. Therefore you should also love each other, and do all good deeds to one another. I require no more of you. I do not say you are to build for me churches, make pilgrimages, fast, sing, become monks or priests, or that you are to enter into this order or rank; but you do my will and service when you do good to each other, and no one cares for himself but for others, on this all entirely depends.
22. And these he calls “friends.” By this he does not mean that we should not love our enemies. For he says clearly: “Who lays down his life for his friends.” “His friends” are more than mere “friends.” It may come to pass that you are my friend, and yet I am not your friend, or I may love you and receive you as a friend and offer you my friendship, and yet you may hate me and remain my enemy. Just as Christ says to Judas in the garden: “Friend, do that for which thou art come.” Matthew 27:50. Judas was his friend, but Christ was Judas’ enemy, for Judas considered him his enemy and hated him. Christ loved Judas and esteemed him as his friend. It must be a free, perfect love and kindness toward every one.
23. See, this is what James means when he says, 2:26: “Faith apart from works is dead.” For as the body without the soul is dead, so is faith without works. Not that faith is in man and does not work, which is impossible. For faith is a living, active thing. But in order that men may not deceive themselves and think they have faith when they have not, they are to examine their works, whether they also love their neighbors and do good to them. If they do this, it is a sign that they have the true faith. If they do not do this, they only have the sound of faith, and it is with them as the one who sees himself in the glass and when he leaves it and sees himself no more, but sees other things, forgets the face in the glass, as James says in his first chapter, verses 23-24.
