None likes much to experience one's limits in the hour of need. Limits of time and place, talent and knowledge, strength and skill all frustrate our efforts to live and live as we want. Others can help us sometimes, but occasionally don't or won't help at all. A Caananite woman finds Jesus reluctant to respond … Continue reading When Jesus Holds Back, Hold On!
Faith Alone Works…In Freedom and Delight
God has given us great Freedom by faith in Christ and works in us a new Delight in the Law of the Lord. These two he joins together: Christian Freedom and Delight. Yet some separate them from one another, with devious and dismal result called Antinomianism. Antinomianism ends up denying the identity of God and … Continue reading Faith Alone Works…In Freedom and Delight
Enduring Temptation for You
Temptations come in wide variety, but with only one source and one goal: to sever us from our eternal hope as named children of God. We experience many temptations, but Christ knows them all firsthand and far many more temptations beyond what we bear. They're exhausting, even when overcome. God provides His comfort in Christ … Continue reading Enduring Temptation for You
Faith Alone Works…To Bear Much Fruit
See, the truly pure, good works of God don’t flow from your anxious conscience. Your worried conscience only twists them all up, because you’re not focused on Christ and His cross, but totally looking at yourself. The good works God bids you bring forth don’t come out of your guilty conscience. His Holy works don’t … Continue reading Faith Alone Works…To Bear Much Fruit
Readings for Ash Wednesday Service
Readings for Ash Wednesday Service 1 March 2017 "Faith Alone Works...To Bear Much Fruit" Selections from: The Augsburg Confession, Article XX "Of Good Works" [15] But, although this doctrine is despised by the inexperienced, nevertheless God-fearing and anxious consciences find by experience that it brings the greatest consolation, because consciences cannot be set at rest … Continue reading Readings for Ash Wednesday Service
Faith Alone Works…
God doesn't need our good works, but our neighbor does. Now the 2017 Lenten season arrives in this 500th Anniversary year of the Lutheran Reformation. Martin Luther restored the pure preaching of the Gospel to the people of God: that we are saved by grace, through faith in Christ alone--apart from works of the Law. … Continue reading Faith Alone Works…
What a Blind Man Wants
Which is better, do you think: to be the only blind person in a crowd of those who all see? Or the only One who can see in the crowd of those blind all their lives, never able to look past this very moment to the next which must follow? Jesus stops and goes out … Continue reading What a Blind Man Wants
Where Scattered Seed Grows
This is a terrible parable for preachers. As Jesus sees the crowds coming out, he knows full well how it goes. So much of what he does by his preaching won't ever start to bear fruit. Some takes root and sinks in, but not deep enough to survive through the heat of the day. Others … Continue reading Where Scattered Seed Grows
Why Tithing Will Never Impress Jesus
This isn't a Sunday School lesson about money. This is about Jesus, and the generosity of faith. The quote above is often ascribed to Luther, though I was unable to trace down the exact source. Authentic or not, the principle holds that a genuine faith in Jesus changes more than our personal philosophy or sentimental … Continue reading Why Tithing Will Never Impress Jesus
“I Choose to Give”
Jesus is not like other kings. In the end, Jesus is always more generous towards others than you want or they deserve. He is more just in what He does for you than you probably noticed or expected from Him. If He gives you no less than He promised, you're disappointed. If He gives another … Continue reading “I Choose to Give”
Isaiah 50:4 Blues 