Why This Will Work - Part 3

How often do the children of God try to fix or improve His kingdom using their own methods?

This approach, foolish and disobedient to its core, leads to nothing but division in the church. As sinful men, we want to do things our way using our timing. When an individual, movement, or initiative replaces Christ as the central focus of the church, the unity of the body is inevitably compromised. If there is a place where loving unity has given way to harsh discord, you will find people who have turned away from Christ and sound apostolic teaching.

Look at the discord--the unrighteous bickering--that has been born out of the progressive additions to the church. As more humanly invented systems are introduced you find more division and theological compromise. In many places, the mystical body of the faithful has been reduced to a collection of board meetings, politics, demographic marketing, and partisanship. Christians have abandoned their scriptural call to be "in the world but not of it" in favor of becoming "community-based", "relevantly modern", and "seeker-sensitive".

That does not make my conservative brothers and sisters innocent by any measure. In their zeal to combat this foreign invasion of the church, some have resorted to many of the same progressive methods. The conservatives have taken the bait and have invented their own board meetings, politics, and partisanship.

Rather than addressing the root causes of these issues, they have allowed it to degrade into an us-versus-them battle for the heart of the synod... a heart which should belong to Christ alone. Not only has this move led to more division, it has fundamentally failed to vanquish the errors that this strategy was employed to combat. Not only does progressive theology and practice persist, it seems to flourish and grow in many areas. Do the conservatives recognize this and correctly diagnose their weak strategy? For many this is sadly not the case. They have turned to hopelessness and hand-wringing.

My answer to all of this mess is to stop wasting time just talking about the problem and do what you can to fix it. The bickering has become so absurd that we now argue about whether or not we are arguing and how deep that arguing goes. If public debate and rhetoric was going to work, we should have seen progress by now. In fact, the exact opposite is true.

We only have so much time, so much energy, and so many resources to devote to this issue. All of those assets should be thrown into getting each of our congregations as close to the apostolic model as possible. Think of how far we could go toward unity under pure doctrine if we all got off of our lazy rears and did something about it at the place where it matters the most: the local congregation. We have way too many generals up in the command tent saying, "we are losing on this flank... and that flank... we should counter-attack here, here, and there." We do not have enough people on the front lines taking the steps that are necessary to bring this conflict to a favorable end.

If the battle to defend confessional Lutheranism is really going as bad as you all say, pick up a rifle and head to the front lines. That is where your efforts are actually going to make a difference. It is very easy to point out what is wrong and whine about it to an audience that agrees with you. It takes a great deal of blood and sweat to actually deal with the problem.

• Division is defeated by patience, love, and humility.


• Minimalism is defeated by boldly teaching pure doctrine and scripture.


• Partisanship is defeated by focusing on the entire mission of the church through dedication to the Word of God and deference to those who are weaker in the faith.


• Heresy is defeated by equipping everyone with the ability to discern truth from error.


• Unionism is defeated by encouraging love for the Lutheran confessions and Lutheran identity.
  

This kind of stuff takes sacrifice. It is very easy to identify a problem that should be fixed. It is quite another to devote yourself to the solution of that problem. If the problem in the LCMS is to be fixed, it will take a great deal of individual effort to repair the division from the ground up. The big question is: Are we willing to do the work?

Why This Will Work - Part 2

Despite the obvious division in our synod, there are still bastions of confessional Lutheranism in every city that I have visited. Such a statement of good news does not make for a popular blog post, but it is the truth. If one wants to find a confessional church, they are readily available in every city of every state that I have visited this year. These lighthouses of truth shine light out into the theological darkness of American Protestantism. Even in those places where progressive theology has all but replaced sound doctrine, stalwart churches stand against the tide of error and unionism.

If you visit a Mecca of works-righteous Christianity like Houston, you can still find dedicated Lutheran pastors saying things like:

"In order to fulfill this Great Commission, to baptize and make disciples, you--yourself--must be a disciple of Our Lord Jesus Christ. A disciple by definition is a person who follows a particular teacher....To be a disciple, you must believe that what your teacher is teaching is the Truth; not just truth, but the Truth."

As the humanly invented programs and business models gain high praise here on earth, the angels in heaven continue to rejoice over the thankless grunt work that the good and faithful servants are doing every day. Despite what you may be told by the hot-heads on both sides, there are many churches who love sound doctrine and seek to walk with a spirit of peaceful mercy toward one another. They do not have the time to bicker and seek public glory for their many accomplishments. They are too busy following the New Testament model for the church: faith, love, good order, peace, unity, and righteousness. They are too busy lifting each other up, teaching their young children the Athanasian Creed, holding regular prayer services during the week, and helping the poor in their community.

In the last year, I have visited over a dozen faithful churches that you have probably never heard of or seen. Their humble spirits prevent them from attempting to draw attention their way. The various factions in the synod are so occupied with the task of tilting at windmills that they fail give these congregations a moment's notice. Do not lose sight of the fact that they do exist. Do not forget that there are places where the systems are working, the gospel is being taught in its purity, and the sacraments are being properly administered.

Church growth is not a popularity contest. The Body of Christ is not a place for division and discord. It is not a place for finger-pointers, doom-sayers, and credit-seekers. In all things we are a people of faith, hope, and love. I pray that God will cause this fruit to grow in all of us.

"Who is wise and understanding among you? By his good conduct let him show his works in the meekness of wisdom. But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast and be false to the truth. This is not the wisdom that comes down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic. For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice. But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere. And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace."

-James 3:13-18

Why This Will Work - Part 1

I apologize for the delay between posts. The demands of my vocation(s) have given me little time for online posting. I doubt that anyone reads this anymore, but that has never stopped me from opening my big mouth in the past.

There has been a wave of doom and worry flowing through the Lutheran blogosphere. It is really easy to get drawn into the "glass half empty" mentality. The LCMS has given people good reason to worry here lately. So what do we do?

That is a telling question: "what do we do?" It is easy to get anthropocentric when things become difficult. The devil wants us to despair. He wants the confessional elements in the LCMS to become cynical. He wants you to despair. He wants you to abandon your light house. He wants you to stop calling into the wilderness. He wants you to abandon your brothers and sisters and right them off as hopeless.

We are supposed to be a people of hope, brothers and sisters. Christ continues to care for His bride and protect the truth of the Gospel. All around the synod, the right things are taking place and the right things are being taught. I see it all the time in church after church as the Army sends me all across the United States.

If you joined the Lutheran Church expecting a unified body free from heresy and division, then you haven't paid attention to Lutheran history. If you think that there will be a time before the Last Day where we will not have to guard against things like pietism and crypto-calvinism, then you are not living in the reality of the church militant. We have been fighting this fight since Luther. It is not going to get any easier and it is not going to feel any better. Suck it up and perform your calling.

Someone give me a time in our history when these elements have not been on the brink of extinguishing the flame of confessional Lutheranism. Such a utopian day has never existed and is not likely to exist in this life. Do we lay down and die? Is that the legacy of Luther?
I am alarmed by the protestant errors that are infiltrating Lutheranism. As a recent convert from the charismatic movement, I think that it hurts me the most.

...but it doesn't take much to see the good that is going on all around. In a world where the squeaky wheel gets the grease, the LCMS is full of well-oiled, confessional people who quietly live out their vocations. We must not lose sight of that.

So the question: what do we do?

1 Timothy 4:6-16

"If you put these things before the brothers, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, being trained in the words of the faith and of the good doctrine that you have followed. Have nothing to do with irreverent, silly myths. Rather train yourself for godliness; for while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come. The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance. For to this end we toil and strive, because we have our hope set on the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe."

"Command and teach these things. Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity. Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation, to teaching. Do not neglect the gift you have, which was given you by prophecy when the council of elders laid their hands on you. Practice these things, immerse yourself in them, so that all may see your progress. Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers."

Brothers and sisters, the sky is not falling... it has just always been lower than we want it to be. We shouldn't cry out in panic every time we look up.

Before Christ's Church had "worship wars"...

...She was embroiled in "food fights", "circumcison conflicts", and "day debates". Sinful man loves to quibble over adiaphora and he will stomp all over the Ten Commandments to do it. With about 2,000 years to calm down over these three ancient divisions, most of us can see how silly it all was. What will the Christians of 4008 AD say about this essential arguement we are having today about what style of music a Christian should exclusively use to worship God?

With the modern hot topic of the "worship wars" in mind, read the following passage of Romans 12 & 13. Look at the instructions on how to resolve this conflict over the cleanliness of some kinds of food and the observence of certain holy days. What can we apply to our current situation about the appropriateness of some kinds of music? What do they have in common?

Quite alot if you ask me. After all, nothing goes together to make a good time like holy days, music, food and............circumcision. You get the idea.

Romans 12

1 As for(A) the one who is weak in faith, welcome him, but not to quarrel over opinions. 2 (B) One person believes he may eat anything, while the weak person eats only vegetables. 3 Let not the one who eats despise the one who abstains, and(C) let not the one who abstains pass judgment on the one who eats, for God has welcomed him. 4 (D) Who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another? It is before his own master[a] that he stands or falls. And he will be upheld, for the Lord is able to make him stand.

5 (E) One person esteems one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike.(F) Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. 6 The one who observes the day, observes it in honor of the Lord. The one who eats, eats in honor of the Lord, since(G) he gives thanks to God, while the one who abstains, abstains in honor of the Lord and gives thanks to God. 7 For(H) none of us lives to himself, and none of us dies to himself. 8 For if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then,(I) whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s. 9 For to this end Christ(J) died and lived again, that he might be Lord both(K) of the dead and of the living.

10 Why do you pass judgment on your brother? Or you, why do you despise your brother? For(L) we will all stand before(M) the judgment seat of God; 11 for it is written, (N) "As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess[b] to God."

12 So then(O) each of us will give an account of himself to God.

13 (P) Therefore let us not pass judgment on one another any longer, but rather decide(Q) never to put a stumbling block or hindrance in the way of a brother. 14 I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus (R) that nothing is unclean in itself,(S) but it is unclean for anyone who thinks it unclean. 15 For if your brother is grieved by what you eat, (T) you are no longer walking in love.(U) By what you eat, do not destroy the one for whom Christ died. 16 (V) So do not let what you regard as good be spoken of as evil. 17 (W) For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but (X) of righteousness and (Y) peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. 18Whoever thus serves Christ is (Z) acceptable to God and approved by men. 19 So then let us (AA) pursue what makes for peace and for (AB) mutual upbuilding.

20 (AC) Do not, for the sake of food, destroy the work of God.(AD) Everything is indeed clean, but (AE) it is wrong for anyone to make another stumble by what he eats. 21 (AF) It is good not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything that causes your brother to stumble. [c] 22 The faith that you have, keep between yourself and God.(AG) Blessed is the one who has no reason to pass judgment on himself for what he approves. 23 But whoever has doubts is condemned if he eats, because the eating is not from faith. For whatever does not proceed from faith is sin.


Romans 15

1(A) We who are strong (B) have an obligation to bear with the failings of the weak, and not to please ourselves. 2 (C) Let each of us please his neighbor for his good, to build him up. 3 For (D) Christ did not please himself, but as it is written, (E) "The reproaches of those who reproached you fell on me." 4 For (F) whatever was written in former days was written for our (G) instruction, that through endurance and through (H) the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope. 5 May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you (I) to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, 6 that together you may with one voice glorify (J) the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. 7 Therefore welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God.

Christ's Nativity: Word and Sacrament

Location is important. Lots of people this time of year draw meaning from the lowly birthplace of Jesus: the eating trough in a stable. This low beginning is used to underline the fact that the King of the Universe humbled Himself and descended to man.

Our fathers agreed, but also saw a sacramental character in the nativity of Our Lord. They looked at the event and location of Christ's birth as typological references to the Sacraments of the Altar and Baptism.

Here is a baptismal expression of the nativity:

"Although, therefore, that infancy, which the majesty of God's Son did not disdain, reached mature manhood by the growth of years and, when the triumph of His passion and resurrection was completed, all the actions of humility which were undertaken for us ceased, yet to-day's festival renews for us the holy childhood of Jesus born of the Virgin Mary; and in adoring the birth of our Saviour, we find we are celebrating the commencement of our own life. For the birth of Christ is the source of life for Christian folk, and the birthday of the Head is the birthday of the body."

"Although every individual that is called has his own order, and all the sons of the Church are separated from one another by intervals of time, yet as the entire body of the faithful being born in the font of baptism is crucified with Christ in His passion, raised again in His resurrection, and placed at the Father's right hand in His ascension, so with Him are they born in this nativity." -St. Leo the Great

Here is a eucharistic expression of the nativity:

"He found that man had become a beast in his soul and so He is placed in the manger, in the place of fodder, that we, changing our animal way of living, may be led back to wisdom that becomes humanity stretching out not towards animal fodder but to the heavenly bread for the life of this body." -St. Cyril of Alexandria

HT: Our beloved Pastor Paul Alms at Incarnatus Est

Worship Wars

I am an ultra-liturgical nut.

After decades playing some of the most modern praise music one can imagine, my personal tastes have swung to the opposite extreme in the spectrum. My brain isn't just trapped in a previous century... it is in the last millennium. When I hear "traditional music" I think of the Liturgy of St. James and hymns that were written using neumes and cheironomic notation. When I hear "contemporary music" I think of anything that was written after the invention of the modern musical staff... say 1500 AD or so. I want real candles. I want to see genuflections, chanted readings, and incense censors. My wish list is very long and very old.

But my personal tastes do not matter. It is not my duty to force them into places where they are not wanted. I will educate and expose people to my passion--even encourage the adoption of my passion, but I must never forget that it might be only my passion. I am not here to cause stumbling blocks. I am strong enough in the faith to do without some of my personal tastes, but I know that many of my brothers and sisters are not. So even though my wishes might even test the limits of some of the most conservative among us, I am perfectly content to be a very moderate Lutheran when it comes to corporate practice. Why? Because I know where my place is in the pecking order of the church: Love God and love your neighbor as yourself.

It is not necessary that specific ceremonies be universally practiced or observed in a uniform manner. The essence of the church is no more than the Gospel preached in its purity and the Sacraments properly administered.

In case you haven't noticed, there is an attitude of disrespectful, smug contempt on all sides of "the worship issue". For all of those who love their particular tastes so much more than their brother that they treat human inventions with more esteem and care than actual people, I present Romans 15:1-7:

“We who are strong have an obligation to bear with the failings of the weak, and not to please ourselves. Let each of us please his neighbor for his good, to build him up. For Christ did not please himself, but as it is written, "The reproaches of those who reproached you fell on me." For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope. May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God.” [Rom 15:1-7 ESV]

From Living Body to Gruesome Corpse

Many people complain that there is not enough unity in the Body of Christ. Their main concern seems to be a unification of the church. While this is an admirable goal, they are willing to sacrifice the truth in order to achieve it. Jesus Christ is the Word; His truth is central to the life of the church. A body without the head is nothing more than a decapitated corpse. A unified, headless corpse may resemble a living body in many ways, but it has no life. It is dead.

"That's it man, game over man, game over!"

With those immortal words, the legendary patron saint of Missouri Lutheranism, St. William Hudson of Aliens, invites us to understand the reality that we are surely finished... doomed even. We have lost people. We are all alone as that acid-spitting menace takes over our base. Sure we fought well, but we do not stand a chance. It has never been this bad. We should just give up. The alien monsters in the synod have already won. Now is the perfect time to panic and wet yourself.

Forget Pelagianism, Arminianism, synergism, and all the other isms that you have ever heard of. It seems that the most despised heresy in the LCMS is Optimism. Nothing else has been so universally anathemized and mocked. Ha! There is no room for something as foolish and unLutheran as *spit* hope! Everyone should just face the facts and ride this sinking ship until you have to swim for yourself--if you aren't swimming alone already.

This worry is as old as the Reformation itself. You can read these sentiments as they are expressed throughout our history. It is a devilish fear that creeps into the hearts of good men to shake their resolve and break their spirit. It is an attack against faith itself. From this unjustified panic, worries about the fate of the church begin to blossom and bear fruit. It causes us to doubt that we are in the right place, fighting the right battles, and making a positive impact. This resignation strangles our heart. It causes us to assume the worst about our church and our brothers. What then? Do we curl up and wither away? Do we wait until we are so novel that we are stored on the museum shelf for future generations to look at? Do we abandon all hope, surrender, and flee the field of battle while there is still work to do? Do we crack like our beloved St. Hudson?

Are there problems? Duh. Find a single place on earth where living humans congregate that is not splitting at the seams while trying to destroy itself. This is the nature of sin. This is the nature of our fallen world. Get your hide up off the floor and deal with it.

There is a pathetic undercurrent of hopelessness in our synod. If you listen carefully, you can hear many good Christians bemoan the futility of it all. That isn't a spirit of unity and boldness. It sounds more like grumbling or resignation. Start talking about how the synod is doing and it is Y2K all over again for most people. Dooooom!

The Hudsonites scream, "Game over!" They are the first to point out any number of woes that have befallen us in their lifetime. Because the LCMS is made up of sinful people, they are usually true in one way or another... so? We aren't confessional. We may be doctrinally sound, but we do not practice what we believe. We've lost so much since C.F.W. Walther. Most of our congregations have embraced neo-Evangelicalism. We are too Purpose Driven. The liberals run the show. The conservatives run the show. Those silly moderates are letting all of this happen. Our laity does not know enough about what we believe. The LCMS is not relevant. It does not reach people. It subscribes to a Platonic view of the church that it will never achieve. We fall short. We miss the boat. We aren't unified. We have preserved apostolic doctrine, but not tradition. We are in lock step with the papists. We stumble. We go along with the culture. We are shrinking. We argue. We do not stand up when we should. We do not hold each other accountable. We are squandering this great gift of Lutheranism by trying to reinvent ourselves.

Law... law... law... law... law... law... law... law... barf.

...and yet, the LCMS still manages to produce confessional upstarts like me. There are churches who are actually abandoning their blended services. There are places where the trends that we seem to hate so much are reversing. More importantly: the LCMS still takes know-nothing converts and fills them with a passion for the fathers, apostolic tradition, the UAC, and ancient worship forms. I am not from an arch-conservative congregation either. How can this be? How does the LCMS continue from here amid so much unLutheranism? How will our synod remain distinct when so many have sold out? Without us, how will the next generation know the right way?

They will be shown the truth, silly. How can someone like Dr. Krauth be brought up with a teacher like Pr. Schmucker? How can someone like Martin Luther rise from a horrific age like pre-Reformation Europe? The answer is as simple as the Gospel.

Despite all the doom talk that I have heard in my first year as a Lutheran, Christ continues to preserve His church. The church will remain undefeated until the Last Day. Time and again, she snatches victory from the jaws of defeat and preserves truth in the face of horrible error. The light and the fire will not go out. The legacy will continue. It did so for 2,000 years before us and it will continue long after we are all gone. When you get down to it: the church is not really our work at all, but the work of the Holy Spirit. Sure our actions have consequences, but we are letting our macro view of the big picture (and our dim opinion of the future) effect how we look at the things that we actually have the power to improve as individuals. We must be careful not to worry so much about the health of the forest that we neglect the trees that are right next to us.

Positive change has never been secured by hand-wringing. The LCMS will not improve through fanatical witch hunts and the rhetorical genocide of strawmen. Hearts and minds are won from the pulpit, at the alter, in the Word, from reading the fathers, in confirmation, and by our good examples. If a correction is to happen, it will not be from the top down, but from the bottom up. It will not come from pushing back the tide, but by becoming a tide ourselves. This is grunt work. It is dirty, low, and hard. We secure confessionalism by loving pastoral care and genuine encouragement from a passionate laity. All of the great works of the church have been constructive, preservative ones... not destructive.

Compared to where we've been (even in the last 200 years), our current situation is not defeat but victory. People would have you believe that this might be the worst it has ever been. Generations of God's people have been saying that myth since the slaves left Egypt. We must look to the good; to what God promises. Quit complaining and grumbling.

Look at the promising trends! Weekly communion is returning. Private confession is returning. A passion for the Scripture and the historic Lutheran church is returning.

I have visited plenty LCMS parishes as Uncle Sam sends me all around this great country. I have spoken to dozens of pastors and scores of laymen. There is one analogy that I hear time and again. I hate it. It is false. Contrary to popular opinion, the LCMS is not a ship and it is not sinking into the waves of error and unLutheranism. She is larger than that limited view can see and her progress is slower than that impatient view might demand. She may not be perfect, but she is not a sinking ship. We are not her doomed crew.

She is a Phoenix. Like all of the great generations of the church before her, she is rising from the ashes of doctrinal error and bad practice. She is the same immortal Phoenix which rose in the days of Luther, Giertz, and Krauth. Despite the work of her enemies, she can never be killed. Each time we try to kill her, she rises again. She is a glimpse of a portion of the invisible church as it becomes manifest in the preaching of the Gospel and the proper administration of the Sacraments. Her birth is effected each time the fire of Spirit and truth takes hold. She is a warm beacon of light in the dense fog of American Protestantism.

Filled with the legacy of the holy saints and martyrs, the refreshing wind of the living church in all times and places now pushes her aloft. Her hot pinions span the continent as she majestically rises and turns skyward. She struggles and staggers at times, but she slowly lifts from the ground the same way that she has done countless times before: slowly, painfully, deliberately.

She is an organic creation of Almighty God; a gift to His people. She is one entity. She is unified by every flaming feather that patiently works to speed her ascent and struggles to lift her up. Her eyes remain fixed to the horizon as she eagerly waits for her Savior to return. Isolated fires that dot the countryside leap up to her and share in her glory and the light that she offers. Her bosom remains the welcome sanctuary of weary, hurting sinners. Her call is one of repentant joy that pierces the night and rattles the foundations of many who still want to slumber. She is a refuge of truth and love. I am living proof. She is my family. She is my mother.

Do not slander her good name in my presence.

Krauth on Unionism

I started enjoying my Halloween treat from CPH over the weekend: The Conservative Reformation and Its Theology by Dr. Charles Porterfield Krauth.

I wish that someone had warned us that this book was such a monstrous tome! I had to get a dolly to wheel it in off of my front porch (...okay, not really but I was sure to lift with my legs when I picked it up.) I am barely through the preface of what the introduction admits is a "mammoth offering".

This Everest is worth the read. The introduction provides samples from his other works which reveal that Dr. Krauth draws from an endless well of thought-provoking insight:

"It is not the division which pains, but their discomfort of it. Sects are sorry, not for the sin [of sectarianism], but for the penalty it brings, and the unionism of the day is trying to escape from God's punishment of the sin of sectarianism without abandoning the sin itself. Unionism does not mean to remove division, but to perpetuate and hallow it." -Dr. Krauth, Religion and Religionisms, p. 237.