The Nihil Rule

" We thought for too long that if we were out of step with the world around us, nobody would bother with the Church.  What happened is that we did such a good job of being in tune with the world that there was no compelling reason for anyone to give us a second look.  Only the vain enjoy the echo of their own voices and that is what we gave them -- a faint echo instead of the sword of God's Word.  In order to save the patient, we killed it and the Church has been on life support ever since.  Of course we are out of step with the world.  That is how Christ intended us to be.  We speak the Gospel of the set apart to set apart those who by the Spirit's power will hear and believe.  This Church will never die but the Church we created to listen and fall in line with the world is dead already." - Pastoral Meanderings: The problem. . .

TGC 311 — Patterns of Holiness — Gottesdienst Another excellent interview with Fr. Karl Fabrizius on the patterns of holiness in the Old Testament and how they inform the new - after all, we are not functional Marcionites , are we ? You need to listen to get the whole thing, but a few interesting insights:  -  Ananias and Sapphira as a parallel to Nadab and Abihu  - Oholah and Oholibah bringing the world in the sanctuary  - Miriam wanting the office and God striking her with leprosy as a parallel to Simon the Sorcerer and his simony Fr. Fabrizius also took a nice shot at ' the fruit of the vine ' argument. And the conclusion which earns a hearty Amen in these parts:   ...Methodist hymns lead to everything else...

    The screen capture above comes from an excellent paper by David Gard in CTQ 74. You can watch part of the presentation  on this paper he gave at a symposium (incomplete due to technical difficulties). While the WELS does not formally subscribe to the idea of "everyone a minister," it certainly exists in practice when a "functional" view of ministry can take the Office of the Holy Ministry and perform a functional decomposition and delegate tasks to just about anyone in the congregation (subject to the headship principle) - (or is this just good old "Lutheran Leadership TM "?) For instance: Elders are instructed and encouraged to consecrate the sacrament for shut-ins in some congregations Laymen and women serve as lectors Laymen commune the Pastor Laymen commune congregation in absence of Pastor in some congregations Women communing other women A seminary professor stating, "Scripture does not say that a woman should not be ordained or that she s...

Everybody Loves Raymond - Season 9, Episode 7 "Debra's Parents" My wife and I have a soft spot for several old TV shows including Everybody Loves Raymond. We were poor college students and our idea of good clean Christian premarital fun included watching TV while eating dinner, and the lineup included the sturdy sitcom Everybody Loves Raymond.  We were recently traveling and flipping through the channels in a hotel room we stumbled on a re-run. The gist of the episode: Debra's parents had recently been divorced. They were staying in town for Thanskgiving - separately - but were caught consummating the marriage they no longer had. And of course the whole family, including Raymond's parents Marie and Frank caught wind of it. Deb's parents tried to defend it by saying they were just trying to have fun, and appealed to their personal happiness, to which Marie replies: "If we all did what made us happy this world would be a terrible place" Marie is spot o...

"I did not have to believe anything simply because it was in the Bible. How stunning that conclusion was.” -HARRY EMERSON FOSDICK Harry Emerson Fosdick wrote the hymn "God of Grace and God of Glory", Hymn 770 in CW:H (don't look too smug, LCMS-bros, it's in your hymnal too!). He was a theological liberal, an opponent of the fundamentalists such as J. Gresham Machen (author of "Christianity and Liberalism", a staunch defender of what we would call conservative Christianity, the inerrancy of Scripture, etc.). You can read a well written history and exposition of Fosdick at Chailles.com Fosdick was supported by John D. Rockefeller. Fosdick's sermon "Shall the Fundamentalists Win?" had over 100,000 copies distributed with the intent of pushing liberal Christianity over and against orthodox Christianity. Rockefeller was so enamored with Fosdick he coordinated with him and built Riverside Church , with Fosdick presiding. Fosdick insisted the chu...

  Courage Is A Habit This is a fantastic resource for any parent who is not homeschooling their kids (including parents who send their children to WELS parochial schools - since MLC is teaching the teachers SEL  we should expect to see it spread throughout our WELS affiliated schools - and indeed, it already is being used in Fox Valley Lutheran (FVL) affiliated grade schools through curriculum from Savvas and FOSS) Friendly reminder: homeschool your kids!