Claimed, gathered and sent

We are now safely at our hotel in RI where we'll be for the next 6 days. The time in Rochester was such a blessing with Sarah and Grace. Sunday was a day of revisiting the past with its memories. We drove around to most of the places I had lived as a child and adult and where Sarah had lived as a child. I'm now working on the sermon I'll be preaching at our home church on Sunday. The verse that sticks with me the most from the gospel reading is the last one, " No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father's heart, who has made him known. " If we're close to someone's heart, don't we make them known? When my daughter, Sarah and our granddaughter, Gracie visited us this year at seminary, we introduced them to everyone! We could not help ourselves! We wanted to make them known because they are close to our hearts. Speaking of which, Gracie lost her first tooth while we were visiting. She's in the picture on the left.

It's been a while since I've posted anything. This semester has been a hectic one. Below are some thoughts on baptism from Martin Luther's Large Catechism. The citations refer to the page and paragraph numbers in the Book of Concord. Baptism’s necessity is an issue I have had to struggle with. In Palestine , while working with Muslims who wanted to follow Jesus , the question arose whether one could follow Christ without being baptized. We (who were not Lutheran at that time) concluded that it was not, yet today, I bump up against Luther ’s teaching in the Large Catechism that the corollary to the Great Commission is “whoever rejects baptism rejects God’s Word, faith, and Christ …” (460.31). These adults were not rejecting it, but had not yet understood the need. It was not something we made an issue of. For one’s salvation it may not be essential, but to know the fullness of God in one’s life, to have the daily reassurance of God’s presence, to grow into all God has

Yesterday we celebrated two anniversaries. The first was our wedding anniversary. Six years ago yesterday Ray and I got married. It's been an awesome journey together so far, part of which brought us to our second anniversary. One year ago yesterday we were on our way to Gettysburg to begin seminary. Now the first year of seminary has been completed, including the crazy world of summer Greek which a new group of students will soon be experiencing. Teaching parish is done. Now my classmates and I are completing CPE and will be starting our second year of seminary. Many of of never would have imagined that this is where we'd be. I'm grateful for anniversaries, for those times to look back over the year or years and rejoice in God's grace in the blessings and the difficult times. "Great is thy faithfulness."

Martin Luther had some very strong feelings about our free will or lack thereof. Below is a short essay I wrote concerning his work Bondage of the Will. In Bondage of the Will, Luther is responding to Erasmus’ writing of The Freedom of the Will from a number of different perspectives with appropriate arguments for each. What Luther keeps returning to however, is his Augustinian heritage. Augustine taught that sin was a curving in or turning in toward oneself. [1] That being the case, the human will was infected with evil and unable to choose correctly. Luther states unequivocally that “…free choice is a pure fiction. [2] Luther supports his response to Erasmus’ arguments using the scripture and reason. Arguing from Pauline epistles, Luther states that according to Paul , “Universal sinfulness nullifies free choice.” [3] His argument follows that all are under God’s wrath, even the very best philosphers and religious people, Jew and Gentile alike. That being the case,

Reform #3 Teaching of Justification by Grace through Faith This was not a new teaching discovered by Luther. There were reformers prior to him that spoke and wrote of God's work of grace of being something outside of us, something we ourselves cannot effect. Rather than a discovery, it was a rediscovery of this truth of God's Word. For Luther , this was the chief article, upon which everything depended. Freedom in our Christian lives and forgiveness of sins is all a free gift that we cannot do anything to earn. We are justified by grace without any merit or work of our own. God makes us God’s own. “On this article stands all that we teach practice…” ( The Smalcald Articles, Lull, p. 357). It is well explained by Luther ’s explanation of the third article of the Apostles’ Creed, “I believe that by my own understanding or strength I cannot believe in Jesus Christ my Lord or come to him.” God does the work, not us. flickr foto