Author: Higher Things

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Current Events

The Cornerstone of Higher Things Conferences

Kaitlin Jandereski

Lounged against a wooden wall before chapel started, I thought deep and hard about my sins – the ones I knew, the ones I didn’t know. And while doing so, I surveyed the crucifix drooped from the ceiling as if it were an unexpected corpse sighting. The body was bruised and stripped of clothes. The nails dripped of innocent blood. There hung the man on it: defeated and dead.

This image – the image of Jesus Christ nailed to a cross – is the cornerstone for every Higher Things conference. Here, we learn, teach and confess Christ and Him crucified for sinners.

This past week was… wait for it, wait for it… no different.

To briefly recap, let’s cover when Pastor Riley taught us that Jesus went through even hell for us: “You’re not an alcoholic, a drug addict, a slut, a queer. You’re not anything but a baptized child of Christ. And, yeah, the Old Adam likes to say, ‘I got a lot of problems! How can I be saved?’ But Jesus likes to say, ‘You think you got problems? I died for you. I went to hell for you. Now, that was a problem. But alas, your sins are forgiven. You are mine.’

Confirmation is important, and Vicar Kyle Brown’s breakaway class reminded us of just that. We learned about our identity in Christ, “Name changes in the Bible are very significant. To help you understand, just look at us. When we received Jesus, our own names as Baptized Christians were placed upon our foreheads and upon on our hearts. We changed from who we were – lost and condemned – to who we are now: baptized, saved, forgiven.”

And in Friday’s plenary session, Pastor Mark Buetow taught us why we go to church weekly, “When your memory starts to go, the Word of God doesn’t. It sustains you. So, going to worship every Sunday might get boring as you say the same words and sing similar hymns, but it’s good to have them engraved in your head as they will be the last words you know, but the first words you hear when you open your eyes in paradise.”

Higher Things president, Pastor George Borghardt spent his time telling us that Jesus isn’t for the holy people, but for the lost sinners, “The Gospel isn’t there to alter your behavior, but it’s there to save dead and lost sinners. To bring them back to God each and every time they sin. I repeat: The Gospel is to save sinners. That’s the Gospel because that’s Jesus.”

We sang, too. Oh, did we sing! We sang hymns that pointed us to the Lord’s Supper, such as Chad Bird’s, “The Infant Priest was Holy Born:” “The body of God’s Lamb we eat, a priestly food and priestly meat; On sin-parched lips the chalice pours His quenching blood that life restores.”

I could go on and on, and I’m sure you’d listen. But, instead, check out a Higher Things conference for yourself next year. It’s a conference where high school students spend their time worshiping three times a day on the daily. Confessional, liturgical, Christ and Him Crucified plenary sessions, breakaway classes and late night discussions. It’s all about Jesus. All of the time. And the youth? Well, they devour it. That’s why they keep coming back.

Kaitlin Jandereski was a CCV for Grand Rapids, MI’s 2015 Higher Things’ conference and is a future deaconess. She currently lives in a small town called Bad Axe, Michigan.

Categories
Current Events

Heaven on Earth

Bethany Woelmer

Heaven came to earth this week at Higher Things. It sounds weird, doesn’t it? I mean, we live on earth, right? We have mortal bodies. We are the very dust of this earth, belonging to creation and living in this world as humans. We are sinners, every single one of us, from the very core of our being. There is no denying the fact that earth, even as it houses the greatest temples and treasures of our lives, is not worthy to hold heaven itself, even for a second.

But what if I told you that it does happen? What if I told you that there are things not of this world – higher things – that excel beyond the many temples we build, the riches we inherit, and the many other identities that this earth gives us?

This week in Grand Rapids, Michigan, an eight-sided chapel at Calvin College housed over 900 of God’s baptized children, weak in their sins, thirsty for God’s salvation, and hands outstretched not to offer the only “lower” things they possess but to receive the “higher” things promised in Word and Sacrament. “High above earth [God’s] temple stands,” excelling over all other earthly temples and giving to us the highest and greatest gift, that is, the Gospel. God, who became man in human flesh, came from heaven to earth, choosing to “live with us in love, making our bodies His temple,” as these forgiven sinners sang as part of the eternal family of Christ in heaven. Their song of “Te Deum” soared through the chapel in glorious unity under the cross. Even as church bells are ringing, even as voices are raising, and even as the Gospel is being proclaimed and taught, God’s message of salvation continues to shine.

Here at Higher Things, we profess boldly with an “Amen,” knowing that where Christ is, there also is His Bride, the Church. From the lips of our sinful mouths comes the sweet Gospel we sing that gives us faith – faith that comes only from Jesus and delights in Him. Here at Higher Things, we are called into God’s temple of Christ and also into the world as Christ lives in us. Here at Higher Things, God comes to us, stooping low to heal us when we falter by giving His Son in our flesh to be our Savior. Here at Higher Things, heaven coming to earth does happen, and that is certainly something worth singing about!

Bethany Woelmer is a member at Faith Lutheran Church in Plano, TX.

Categories
Catechesis

Forgiveness Isn’t a Beauty Queen

Deaconess Ellie Corrow

Forgiveness doesn’t look like much. In fact it’s down-right ugly. We expect that when God does something for it to be beautiful, spectacular even. This is the God of TV who sends gorgeous angels to intercede, while flooding onlookers with a soft, gentle light that does not reveal the flaws in anyone’s complexion. Rarely do the mystics speak of finding God in the mundane, much less the ugly, rather they will speak of finding God in a beautiful landscape, sunset, fields of rainbows, butterflies, and kittens. This is because our Old Adam is programmed to never really see the things of God, instead he defines himself as God, so what he sees as good, right, and beautiful, must then be God. The Old Adam cannot afford to see the things of God, to see the reconciliation wrought only by bloody hands and feet on a hillside outside Jerusalem, because there is no room for him in that reconciliation, instead he must die. To fallen human senses, forgiveness smells like death.

The trouble with looking for Christ with our eyes is that the Kingdom He reigns is entirely backwards. If we stood on a hillside outside Jerusalem two thousand years ago, and witnessed the death of the Author of Life, we would not have seen much of anything at all. Just another dead Jewish man, bearing a punishment foisted on Him by the ruling authorities. Our eyes would not see it for what it was. When we witness a baptism, our eyes only see a sprinkle of water and few words – little else. No visible angels, no halos, nothing but a forehead stained with baptismal water. Similarly, when we approach the Lord’s altar to receive His gifts, we are the company of angels and archangels, yet all we can really see is a wafer, a sip of wine, and a few words uttered by your pastor. It seems less holy still when you consider the sins of the annoying neighbor kneeling next to you at the communion rail.

We think the Kingdom of God should come signs and wonders, visible to something other than the eyes of faith, and though that day will come, today this is not how we’re given to see. Instead we’re invited by Christ to see the backwardsness of His kingdom. A Kingdom where children, whores, and tax collectors are the greatest in heaven, and the holy priest is the least. A Kingdom where the prodigal son is celebrated and the “good” son is whining over his father’s mercy.

The Gospel defies all logic in who it welcomes and how it is delivered, so it’s no surprise that many reject the humble signposts establishing His reign on Earth. But this simple backwardsness of Christ’s reign is good news for us. This means the baptized do not look for the holy ways in which they may serve Christ, instead their ordinary work for their neighbors is sanctified. It means we need not worry if God has forsaken us in our crosses and trials, instead we can bear them in faith, knowing our lives are marked by the hiddenness of Christ’s cross. Most of all it means that however great our sins, how frightening this world, there is One who fights for us, who reigns in His body broken, given, for you.

Dcs. Ellie Corrow serves as the Missionary Care Coordinator for the Office of International Mission.

Categories
Pop. Culture & the Arts

It’s just a pair of boots

Rev. Randy R Sturzenbecher

It’s just a pair of boots, leather and wood.
Black leather with a little white stitching.
They fit well and will offer many miles of taking the path less traveled.

The boots do tell a story other than a gift from good friends or made in Texas.
The boots cover my broken ankle and foot with the Hide from another.
Blood had to be shed for me to walk.

The leather is black, the color of dark, death and sin.
The hide was not that color originally as God made it.
Man did this.

The heel is wood, from a tree somewhere that carries the weight of my brokenness.
Very much like the tree that carried the weight of Jesus.
His blood shed as the perfect sacrifice for my hide, my darkness, my sin.

Around the outside of the black leather and just above the wooden heel are two rows of white stitching. The thread weaves in and out of the soul of the boot binding it all together.
In and out the white strands stand in stark contrast to the black of the Hide and then it hides again. Much like my life, saint and sinner day in and day out.
The light of Christ’s holiness and forgives shines and then is hidden by my darkness and sin.
The prefect white stitch holds it all together…. the soul the hide God’s perfect redeemed Creation in Jesus.

There in only one hole in the boot for me to put my brokenness into. Jesus said “I am the way the truth and the life no one come to the Father except through me.”
There is only one way in… to walk…in Jesus.

These boots will walk and kneel in front of the altar as they lead me to the pulpit to preach.
They will carry me as I walk with hurting families through the valley of the shadow of death.
They will support me as I promise hope in a dead Savior who sacrificed His blood and hide for me.
Jesus now lives and has covered my brokenness that I may live to walk in His ways.
They will protect my feet from all the things that seek to stumble and stain me.

The boots are a gift. Underserved, but given out of love from good friends, very much like Jesus giving His life for mine out of love and so underserved.

Rev Randy R Sturzenbecher is pastor at Divine Shepherd Lutheran Church. Black Hawk, SD.

Categories
Life Issues

What Is Your Tic?

Bethany Woelmer

There is not one person in this world who has not experienced any degree of suffering that has hurt them emotionally and physically. There is not one person in this world who has not, filed away in their past, things that they wish had never happened – things that have changed their life, things that they have carried with them to the present. And there is not one person in this world who lacks that certain “tic,” the uncontrollable itch inside of them, a weakness attributed to them since birth. A weakness that is hidden within the skin of our flesh, a truth deep within our nature to which others can not clearly see.

I listened to a presentation by a man named Marc Elliot, who talked with us about this idea of suffering which he experienced in a certain way. He asked the question, “What makes you Tic?” What is that little itch inside of you that causes you to act uncontrollably? What unique weakness do you have that you are self-conscious about every day you wake up in the morning? What sufferings do you encounter that not everyone around you fully understands?

For twenty years, Marc Elliot had a serious itch. This was no normal skin itch that we experience on a day-to-day basis. It was an itch of the mind that led him to speak and act in ways he could never control. In order to satisfy the desires of his itch, Marc would utter obscene and offensive words to others, chatter his teeth with small “barks,” and make the riskiest moves possible, all the while apologizing to strangers for such rude behavior. He told them that he had Tourette’s syndrome and that yelling swear words to ease this itch was his body’s way of coping with the syndrome.

However, Marc did not define himself as “one having Tourette’s syndrome.” Rather, he acknowledged the fact that that was just who he is. He is Marc.

Marc continued to tell story after story about his various interactions with people who became uncomfortable being around him. In addition to having Tourette’s syndrome, Marc also had an intestinal disease that left him with only four feet of small intestine, numerous embarrassing trips to the restroom, and five to eight strong bowel movements per day. He was embarrassed by these two weaknesses while growing more aware of the intolerance not only from the people around him but from himself and how he thought of himself.

We know as much as everyone around us the sufferings we face, because we all share in this result of sin in many different ways. We try to put a box around the “tics” inside, yet they still push through. We also ignore those “tics” of other people, judging them for their weaknesses instead of showing human kindness that heals. Not only do we neglect to love others, but we also neglect to love our God who created and redeemed us and who shares in our suffering.

While thinking about this message of the inner struggles of our lives, I couldn’t help but connect it to the idea of Law and Gospel. The Old Adam in us is bound by sin, stricken by the condemnation of eternal death, and beaten by the curse begun in the Garden of Eden. The original sin inherited by birth leads us into committing actions we can never dismiss. The Law is always broken. Sin is always present. It is a part of us; it is a weakness that we struggle with every single day.

Yet God in his love sent His Son to be our Savior, to take upon human flesh in order that this Law would be fulfilled in the person of Christ. His one and only Son died on the cross and rose again for our justification. He made us his own by graciously receiving us into his kingdom that we might live forever. This incarnate Lamb of God comes to us in His Word, proclaiming forgiveness for the sins we commit, for all those sins of neglect toward others in their sufferings and for all those times we neglect to realize who we are because of Christ.

We might not know everything about each other’s lives, but we do know that we are sinners in need of Christ’s forgiveness. The sin that “tics” inside of us can only be suppressed by the proclamation of justification by grace through faith in Christ alone. In Christ, we may stand out and look foolish to the world, but with the Gospel we have the privilege to live as a beacon of light to the world that shines on others with the grace of God’s love shown on the cross by Christ’s human suffering. This ultimate suffering saves us who are weak so that we may live eternally in heaven when all of our “tics” will be no more. What a joy for us Christians to possess now as we live in this promise of eternal life!

Bethany Woelmer is a member at Faith Lutheran Church in Plano, TX.

Categories
Catechesis

Scuba Diving for Sins

Chad Bird

He suspected it was an ambush. The sweet-sounding invitation to come over and join her on Tuesday afternoon. The smell of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies wafting through the air. The glass of cold milk sweating on the table. “Have a seat,” she smiled. He did. Polite small talk. He thanked her and ate a cookie. Drank half the glass of milk. Wiped his mouth with the perfectly folded napkin.

“So, you wanted to talk?”

She did. Not about the unseasonably warm weather or her grandchildren’s new puppy. Other things weighed heavy on her mind. She was concerned, she said. There were things he needed to know. Things about someone in the church.

“Oh,” he said.

“Yes,” she said.

Because he just needed to be aware of a bit of this person’s history. You know, since he was the new pastor and everything.

“Oh,” he said.

“Yes,” she said.

He took another bite of cookie. She cleared her throat and began, “Well, Pastor, there’s a person in this congregation who…”

“These are good cookies,” he said.

She was good at what she did. She concealed her frustration. Just an ever so slight tightening of the lips. “Well, thank you,” she said. “So, as I was saying, there’s a person who…”

But again he spoke. “Before you begin, can I ask you something?”

There was that tightening of the lips again. “I suppose, if you must.”

“Are you about to tell me about someone else’s sin? Because if you are, I need you to do something for me first.”

“And what exactly might that be?”

“First, tell me three of your deepest, darkest sins-you know, the ones you’ve been hiding from the world for years, the ones you don’t want anyone to find out about.”

“I can’t do that! Anyway, that’s no one’s business but my own.”

He picked up another cookie. Met her eyes. Chewed and swallowed. Finished off the milk. “So, what I hear you saying is that you are perfectly willing to confess someone else’s sins, but not your own?”

A long silence followed. Finally, she said, “Have I told you about my grandchildren’s new puppy?”

Everyone would rather hear evil than good about his neighbor, says Luther in the Large Catechism. And not only hear, but like the lady in this story, they’d rather speak evil than good about their neighbor as well.

It’s like this: When people hear that God has cast all our sins into the depths of the sea (Micah 7:19), there are always some who put on scuba gear. They dive deep and scour the ocean bottom to bring back up those sins for all the world to see. Their treasure will be someone else’s scandalous behavior. And they won’t be stingy with the treasure. They’ll share it. Invite others to break off little pieces of it and carry it in their pockets to show to others.

If you’ve been one of those whose sins have been paraded around for everyone to see, you know what this does to you. You feel branded, like a hot iron has forever burned the words of accusation upon your skin. And it becomes like a phobia. You see a group of people talking, and if one of them so much as glances in your direction, you assume they’re talking about what you did. It swallows up your identity. It becomes how you think of yourself and how others think of you. You are “that person,” the one who did _______.

Even if you’ve confessed your sin and have been forgiven, every time someone brings it up again, you relive the same hurt, feel the same shame-hot on your face. At such times you start to doubt the sincerity of your repentance. Maybe you doubt whether God has truly forgiven you. Perhaps you even question whether you’re a believer. I know. This is my life and it has been for years. This is my daily struggle as well. And here’s what I’ve learned.

I’ve learned that those sins that people want to throw in our face are signs of grace. They are signs of grace because every one of them is painted red with the blood of God. The crucified Christ has transformed them from emblems of shame into icons of love. They no longer define us; the blood of Jesus that covers them defines us. That blood says that you are a child of God. It says that your Father has forgiven you and His word is the only word that matters. Everything else that speaks contrary to this forgiving word is a lie.

Your sins are not branded upon your skin because Christ was branded in your place. That deepest, darkest stain that still bothers you-Jesus became that for you. He took that sin away and will not give it back. And in its place He gives you adoption into the family of God, a clean slate, and all the riches of His mercy.

Your sins have been cast into the depths of the baptismal font. And that saving sea is fathomless. No diver can plumb its depths. No one can bring them up again. God has forgiven and forgotten them. But He will not forget you. Every day, every hour, He says to heaven and earth, “This is my beloved son. This is my beloved daughter. And nothing, certainly no one, will ever separate them from my love in Jesus Christ.”

You are baptized. Your sins are no more. This is the truth that drowns every lie. The truth trumpeted from the cross of love. The truth of a God who will stop at nothing to make you and keep you as His beloved child.

Chad Bird is a member of Crown of Life Lutheran Church in San Antonio, Texas. His email address is birdchadlouis@yahoo.com

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HT Legacy-cast

Episode 326: Rev. George Borghardt, Sandra Ostapowich & Rev. Donavon Riley

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Today on HT-Radio, Pr. Borghardt and Sandra are joined by Rev. Donavon Riley. Pr. Riley gets to talk about whatever he wants to talk about aside from Gay Marriage. Tune in to find out what is discussed!

If you have questions or topics that you’d like discussed on HT-Radio, email them to radio@higherthings.org or send a text to 936-647-3235.

Categories
Life Issues

Our Neediest Neighbors

Timothy Sheridan

Wherever you live, you’ve seen them, lying on park benches, standing on the roadside, sitting on street corners, easily identified by disheveled hair, baggy clothes, and bad teeth: the homeless. Maybe you’ve also been one of those people who walk in the opposite direction, lock your car door or roll up your window, at the mere sight of someone holding a sign reading, “God bless,” as if the words written in Sharpie on the bent piece of cardboard were an imprecation rather than a benediction. I’ve seen someone reach for a concealed weapon at the mere approach of a homeless man.

“You always have the poor with you,” Jesus said (Matt. 26:11). Some Christians seem to have taken the Lord’s words as a challenge to prove Him wrong through various relief efforts; others have resigned them to their fate. For as much ardor as the Church seems to have for involvement in worldly politics, many of her number would just as soon leave the poor and the downtrodden to themselves, invoking other gods like self-determination, self-preservation, or the invisible hand of the market. But none of these have anything to do with the God who is the Father of the fatherless and the protector of widows (Psalm 68:5), whose Son became poor for our sakes (II Cor. 8:9).

That’s the God we confess, before whom we piously call ourselves poor miserable sinners, but what is it that we’re really confessing when we scramble for the locks on our car doors, our guns, our excuses for saving our own skins and our own goods at the expense of those who have nothing? We’re admitting that we know full well that what we have could just as easily and effortlessly be snatched from us as was the wealth of those now bereft of everything. We betray just how weak, helpless, scared, and impoverished we truly are. We’re afraid that God, who has promised to provide for all our needs, is actually a tyrant who cruelly and capriciously takes our rightful possessions from us. Perhaps we also fear the poor because in them we see our own poverty.

If that’s really the case, then we’re poor miserable sinners indeed. But because that is the reality of our plight, we are in good company. The Son of Man, who had nowhere to lay His head (Luke 9:58), became poor and miserable for us. In laying aside everything, including His very life, He became even less than the most destitute vagrant – He became nothing (Phil. 2:7).

By becoming the victim of every injustice and misfortune, by allowing Himself to be murdered by the affluent, falling among thieves and robbers, and making His grave with the wicked, Jesus became the neighbor we are to love according to the Great Commandment. In the suffering and bruised countenance of God in the flesh, executed like the greatest of criminals, we realize that where Jesus ends and the neediest of our neighbors begins is intentionally ambiguous: “Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me” (Matt. 25:40).

The distinction between our Lord who has redeemed us and our neighbor whom we are bound to serve is blurred by the blood of Jesus. Encountering the poor is not an aberration in our otherwise comfortable middle-class lives, but is an encounter with Jesus Himself and with people who are not panhandlers, bums, or addicts — they’re our neighbors.

So when you come face-to-face with the poor, it won’t matter what you think of welfare, humanitarian aid, or vagrancy laws. You are free from your anxiety about the stuff to which you try to cling and your own poverty. None of God’s children will be left as orphans. “He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not graciously give us all things?” (Rom. 8:32). Our heavenly Father can’t be out-given. As lord of all in Christ the conqueror, you are free to be the servant of all. Having lost our old lives of sin and death with Christ and having been raised with Him, we have nothing to lose.

Timothy Sheridan is a member of Our Savior Lutheran in Raleigh, NC.

Categories
Catechesis

What Do Pastors Do Anyway?

Rev. Michael Keith

“So, you’re a pastor, eh? What do you do anyway?”

I remember being asked this question by a guy I met only a few weeks after I was ordained. Obviously, you can tell I live in Canada. I remember trying to answer the question by listing a bunch of things that are regularly on any pastor’s “to-do” list each week. After I gave the list the guy said somewhat bored “Oh, yeah. Okay.”

What do you think a pastor does? Some think we only work on Sundays. Some think we sit and pray all day. Some think we go around telling people what they are doing wrong. A pastor is not what a lot of people think he is. A lot of people will go to a pastor seeking advice or counseling for their lives. It can be flattering that people think you have some answers to life that they don’t have. It can be a bit of an ego trip if people come to you seeking wisdom. But let me let you in on a little secret: Pastors have enough trouble trying to get through life in their own life – let alone knowing what is best for yours. Most pastors are not trained as counsellors. Most pastors don’t have any more insight into which career might be best for you than anyone else who might know you. Most pastors don’t know how to fix your relationship with your parents. That’s not really what we do.

The best we can offer is to sit and listen to you. We might help you wrestle with whatever you are struggling with. If the bible has a clear Word on the subject we can point you in that direction. However, a lot of times the Bible does not have a clear Word on some of the things we struggle with deciding in life. We can pray with you and be by your side as you go through life. But we don’t generally have any more insight into how to live life than anyone else.

Now when I get asked the question “What do you do anyway?” I have an entirely different way of answering it. When I am asked what I do as a pastor I answer: “I am a delivery man.”

Pastors are delivery men. More than anything this si our primary responsibility. Everything else is secondary. We are delivery men. It is our job to deliver to you God’s gifts. We do that in different ways – but that is really what a pastor is to do. We preach God’s Word and deliver the Law and the Gospel to you. We teach the Word in Bible study. We baptize people. We deliver Holy Communion to God’s people. We pronounce Holy Absolution. God’s gifts of forgiveness, life, and salvation earned by Jesus are given out in the Word and the Sacraments in the Church. The pastor is the delivery man.

It is important that God’s people know where to go so that they can receive God’s gifts. That’s why Jesus instituted the Church and the Holy Ministry. You go to 7-11 for a slurpee. You go to the Church for God’s gifts. And just so there is no confusion God set up the Holy Ministry so you could be certain that you are receiving the real goods. So you can be absolutely certain that when you go to the Church and go to a called and ordained servant you will receive the gifts Jesus has for you because that is what He has promised. That is why there is this man who is given one job. He is ordained, he is ordered, to do this one job. He is to give the gifts of God to God’s people.

So when you are struggling with guilt and shame, when you are wrestling with doubt and uncertainty, when you feel like God is a million miles away, when you have questions about God’s Word and what it means – go see your pastor. This is what he does. That is why God has given you a pastor. So that He can speak God’s sure and certain Word of love and forgiveness to you. So that he can discuss your questions with you. So that you can hear Jesus speak His words of forgiveness to you in the Holy Absolution. So that He can put Christ’s body in your mouth and pour His blood down your throat so that you would be comforted that Jesus is not far away – but right here with you. This is what pastors are uniquely qualified to do.

So, what do pastors do anyway? They deliver God’s gifts to God’s people through Word and Sacrament in the Church.

It’s a pretty cool job.

Rev. Michael Keith serves as pastor at St. Matthew Lutheran Church and SML Christian Academy in Stony Plain, AB Canada. He can be reached at keith@st-matthew.com.

Categories
Catechesis

Commemoration of the Augsburg Confession

Josh Radke

What are we celebrating when we commemorate this day of the presentation of the Augsburg Confession by the reformers to Emperor Charles V?

St. Paul tells us that division is a part of this life since the Fall. We should not be ashamed when there is division over the Truth of the Word, but neither do we seek it out. The opening paragraphs of the Augsburg Confession demonstrate this.

Lutherans acknowledge that there are Christians in other denominations, which is why we often speak of the church on earth as being an “invisible church”. We affirm they are Christians despite that many folks do not have the blessing to hear the pure doctrines of the Word taught to them; that they have not heard the Law & Gospel preached rightly. Walther said both in lectures and sermons that where the Word and Sacraments are present — even if not in their purity — God still works salvation out of His kindness and mercy. Our Lutheran fathers said this also in the introduction to our Lutheran Confessions (The Book of Concord, Preface: 20).

Even so, it still matters to be a Lutheran of the Augsburg Confession because that Confession and its Apology profess the fullness of the Truth. Before His passion, Jesus prayed that the church on earth would be sanctified by this Truth, and so we have been through the means of grace — that is the Word and the Sacraments.

The Truth matters, and this is what we reflect upon this day. Jesus Himself said that He came not to bring peace, but a sword; this imagery is repeated in the Revelation given to St. John the Evangelist (Rev. 2:12,16), and when St. Paul exhorts Christians to put on “the *full* armour of God” which includes the belt of Truth around our waist (Eph. 2:14).

The Truth of His Word is how God our Father preserves us when we must contend with the devil, the world, and our flesh in cosmic, spiritual warfare beneath the shadow of the cross. And it is our fervent prayer that God would continue to work in us through his Holy Spirit, to reveal the Truth to us and to our neighbors and family: that we might see clearly our desperate need for redemption and remain steadfast upon the Rock of Truth and our salvation, Christ Jesus, during trials and the evil hour. This is our hope for eternal life, for which we wait patiently, and to which we are anchored (Rom. 8:24-25, Heb. 6:13-20).

Josh Radke is deacon at Hope Lutheran Church in Bangor ME. He can be reached at jradke@hopebangor.org.