Review on the Lord’s Supper: Closed Communion Last week, we looked at what we believe about the Lord’s Supper (and confession and absolution). In today’s culture, we may have many who will visit our congregation and NOT believe that they are receiving Jesus’ body and blood for the forgiveness of sins. In Luther’s day, such […]
Acts, Lesson 2: Jesus ascends and then sends the Holy Spirit
May 29, 2014 by
Jesus had just told His Apostles that they would receive power when the Holy Spirit would descend on them. The Spirit would empower them to speak of what their eyes had witnessed when they were with Jesus. The Ascension Read Acts 1:9-11 What takes place with Jesus? The Significance of the Cloud […]
Augsburg Confession, Articles 10-11: The Lord’s Supper and Private Confession
May 25, 2014 by
AC X: The Lord’s Supper Our churches teach that the body and blood of Christ are truly present and are distributed to those who eat the Lord’s Supper [1 Corinthians 10:16]. They reject those who teach otherwise. Rome’s Response: The tenth article does not offend us, for it confesses that in the Eucharist, after the […]
Acts, Lesson 1: Introduction and Acts 1:1-8
May 22, 2014 by
Overview Author: St. Luke. Within the book of Acts, the author does not state who he is. Church tradition, reaching back to the 2nd century, identifies the author as Luke, the Gentile medical doctor and traveling associate of the Apostle Paul (2 Timothy 4:11; Philemon 24). Explicit testimony for the Lukan authorship of Acts comes […]
Tradition in Christ’s Church, Part 2
May 20, 2014 by
This is our pastor’s newsletter article for June, 2014. In last month’s newsletter article, we learned that tradition is not a bad word. In truth, we learned the opposite: Tradition is a good word. However, what matters about tradition is whose tradition we are following. The Apostle Paul wrote to the congregation at Thessalonica: “So […]
Augsburg Confession, Articles 8-9
May 18, 2014 by
AC VIII: The Church (Part 1) Properly speaking, the Church is the assembly of saints and true believers. However, since in this life many hypocrites and evil persons are mingled with believers, it is allowable to use the sacraments even when they are administered by evil men, according to the saying of Christ, “The scribes […]
Augsburg Confession, Articles 6-7
May 18, 2014 by
AC VI: New Obedience Our churches teach that this faith is bound to bring forth good fruits [Galatians 5:22-23] and that it should do good works commanded by God [Ephesians 2:10], because God so wills it. We should not, however, rely on those works to merit justification before God. For forgiveness of sins and justification […]
Augsburg Confession, Articles 4-5
May 3, 2014 by
Last week, we didn’t finish Article 4 as we discussed some related topics and chose to spend time on those. AC IV: Justification 1Our churches teach that people cannot be justified before God by their own strength, merits, or works. 2People are justified as a gift because of Christ, through faith, when they believe […]
Augsburg Confession, Articles 3-4
April 26, 2014 by
AC III: The Son of God 1Our churches teach that the Word, that is, the Son of God [John 1:14], assumed the human nature in the womb of the blessed Virgin Mary. 2And so He has two natures–divine and human–inseparably joined in the unity of one Person: one Christ, true God and true man, who […]
Tradition in Christ’s Church According to the Bible
April 23, 2014 by
This is our pastor’s newsletter article for May, 2014. Today, many are practicing “Christian freedom” by living a way of life that is contrary to the Christian faith! One way of doing that is by seeing faith as only something personal, not communal. It’s both! Just read the New Testament. It’s true: no one can […]
