Neutral or not?

And there are still people who think the media are neutral and objective in their reporting on abortion?  Here is NPR's style sheet on abortion reporting.  You be the judge.

Guidance Reminder: On Abortion Procedures, Terminology & Rights

May 15, 20193:58 PM ET

Mark Memmott

Twitter

As we've covered the new abortion law in Georgia and legislation in Alabama, we've followed long-standing guidance very well. Thank you to all involved.
For those new to the subject, that guidance about abortion and related topics is collected in our Intranet "radio" style guide. We'll attach it below.
One thing to keep in mind about this law and others like it: Proponents refer to it as a "fetal heartbeat" law. That is their term. It needs to be attributed to them if used and put in quotation marks if printed. We should not simply say the laws are about when a "fetal heartbeat" is detected. As we've reported, heartbeat activity can be detected "about six weeks into a pregnancy." That's at least a few weeks before an embryo is a fetus.
Here is the long-standing guidance:
ABORTION PROCEDURES & TERMINOLOGY: Use the term intact dilation and extraction to describe the procedure, or a procedure known medically as intact dilation and extraction; opponents call it partial-birth abortion. On the latter, it is necessary to point out that the term partial-birth is used by those opposed to the procedure; simply using the phrase so-called partial birth abortion is not sufficient without explaining who's calling it that. Partial-birth is not a medical term and has no exact parallel in medical terminology; intact dilation and extraction is the closest description. Also, it is not correct to call these procedures RARE — it is not known how often they are performed. Nor is it accurate to use the phrase LATE TERM ABORTION. Though we initially believed this term carried less ideological baggage when compared with partial-birth, it still conveys the sense that the fetus is viable when the abortion is performed. It gives the impression that the abortion takes place in the 8th or 9th month. In fact, the procedure called intact dilation and extraction is performed most often in the 5th or 6th month — the second trimester — and the second trimester is not considered "late" pregnancy. Thus "late term" is not appropriate. As an alternative, call it a certain procedure performed after the first trimester of pregnancy and, subsequently, the procedure.... Also note:

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NPR doesn't use the term "abortion clinics." We say instead, "medical or health clinics that perform abortions." The point is to not to use abortion before the word clinic. The clinics perform other procedures and not just abortions.
Do not refer to murdered Dr George Tiller as an "Abortion Doctor." Instead we should say Tiller operated a clinic where abortions are performed. We can also make reference to the fact that Tiller was a doctor who performed late abortions.
Here's some additional guidance from Joe Neel, regarding the Unborn Victims of Violence Act:
The term "unborn" implies that there is a baby inside a pregnant woman, not a fetus. Babies are not babies until they are born. They're fetuses. Incorrectly calling a fetus a "baby" or "the unborn" is part of the strategy used by antiabortion groups to shift language/legality/public opinion. Use "unborn" only when referring to the title of the bill (and after President Bush signs it, the Unborn Victims of Violence Law). Or qualify the use of "unborn" by saying "what anti-abortion groups call the 'unborn' victims of violence." The most neutral language to refer to the death of a fetus during a crime is "fetal homicide."
ABORTION RIGHTS:
On the air, we should use "abortion rights supporter(s)/advocate(s)" and "abortion rights opponent(s)" or derivations thereof (for example: "advocates of abortion rights"). It is acceptable to use the phrase "anti-abortion rights," but do not use the term "pro-abortion rights". Digital News will continue to use the AP style book for online content, which mirrors the revised NPR policy. Do not use "pro-life" and "pro-choice" in copy except when used in the name of a group. Of course, when the terms are used in an actuality they should remain.

Advocate. . .

Sermon preached on Pentecost, Sunday, June 9, 2019, at Faith Lutheran Church, Hopkinsville, KY, at the installation of their Vicar, Richard Neely Owen.

The term Holy Spirit is not as common as you might think.  It is used only three times by St. John the Evangelist but only St. John identifies the Holy Spirit as the paraclete, here and in chapter 15.  The English is almost verbatim of the Greek, a word we struggle to explain in English.  Some versions use Comforter, the ESV uses Helper, but the best word is Advocate.

Advocate has a legal context.  One who speaks in your defense.  Perhaps this is the most appropriate one since the Vicar who will be installed today is also an attorney and a retired judge.  The Advocate went with you into the court, spoke on your behalf before the magistrate, and heard at your side the judgment of the bench.  As apt as it might be to focus on this word, I think it best to let the work unpack itself.

Paraclete literally means the one who is called to stand beside you, who speaks to others, sure, but also speaks comfort and encouragement to you.  Jesus is our paraclete.  St. John calls Jesus our paraclete or Advocate before the Father.  God sent forth His only Son into the womb of the Virgin Mary, to be delivered after nine months, to grow and mature as we do, to live holy and righteous as we do not, and to suffer in our place the death of sin and to rise to bestow upon us forgiveness and everlasting life.  Jesus does this saving work from within our midst, flesh of our flesh though without sin.  He is our brother and we His brothers and sisters.  He reconciles us to our heavenly Father and leads us prodigal sons and daughters home to the Father forevermore.

Jesus sends the Holy Spirit as paraclete. Jesus promised not to leave us orphans but to send us the Spirit.  This Spirit will bring to remembrance all that Jesus said and did.  This is not simply because we are forgetful and need to be reminded – which we are – but this is how faith lives, through the goodness of the Lord acting through the means of grace.  Faith recalls the goodness of the Lord by recounting the mighty acts through which God has delivered His people, delivered you and me, and we are made stronger.

The Spirit dwells among us in the Word of God read and preached and in the Sacraments.  The Holy Spirit speaks to us, convicting us of our sin, pointing us to the cross, prompting our fearful hearts to believe the Gospel, and filling us with faith.  The Holy Spirit calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies each one of us through the means of grace.  The Holy Spirit prompts our forgetful minds to recall what God has done to save us but this remembrance is not like recalling a fact.

The Spirit brings to our remembrance what God has done.  Now that’s interesting; remembrance is the same word Jesus uses in the Words of Institution.  Do this as my remembrance.  Anamnesis in Greek.  Jesus says as often as you eat of this bread and drink of this cup you proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes.  Remembrance is not simply pulling back a forgotten fact but receiving its gift and grace and proclaiming in witness that gift and grace before the world.  The Spirit’s work of remembrance is also the work of receiving Christ’s gifts with faith and equipping us to be Christ’s witnesses in the world.  This is how the Spirit works among us.  He works through the Word and Sacraments which are the source and center of our life together in Christ.

The Spirit also speaks on our behalf to the Father.  When prayers falter, He turns our sighs and groans into petitions and prayers.  The Spirit addresses us to the Father through the Son, bringing our needs to Him for answer.  And the Spirit works through the means of grace not only for us but so we might stand before the Father under the banner of Christ’s redeeming blood and be kept holy and blameless until Christ comes again.

But God has given other paracletes.  A pastor is paraclete and it is for this that Vicar Owen is placed here.  He will stand with you, in your midst on Sunday morning as you gather around the Word and Table of the Lord.  He will not be far from you, not in geography or in thought.  But He will not simply defend you or  suffer with you in times of test and trial.  He will speak Christ’s word of comfort and encouragement to you.  You are not alone before the world and neither are you alone with your wounds, disappointments, or trials.  God has ordained the Holy Ministry so that His people are not without a shepherd’s voice, a shepherd’s staff, or a shepherd’s heart, someone to stand among them as God’s man for you.

Vicar and soon Pastor Owen will do this not by motivating you or inspiring you but by bringing you God’s Word.  He will not be left to his own devices on how best to guard and direct you as God’s people.  God has given His ministers the tools through which God works among His people.  It does not end with the worship service on Sunday morning but it certainly begins there.  God meets His people, speaks His living Word into them, accomplishes in them what that word says, and sends them forth as His people in the world.  Vicar Owen will serve you in God’s name, guarding you as God’s own possession, directing you to the heavenly goal, and sustaining you with the Word of God that accomplishes God’s purpose every time it is spoken and preached.

You are not alone, even when eyes do not see another with you.  Christ is Your Advocate before the Father.  He sent His Spirit to be your advocate in His name.  He will speak for you to the Father as you pray but He will also speak to you words of forgiveness and comfort.  He will address you with and through the sacred Word of God so that you know where you came from and where you are going.  But God has also established the office of pastor that you may know where you came from and where you are going as the Word is preached and taught and the Holy Sacraments are administered according to Christ’s bidding. 

Vicar Owen is finishing the last stage of his formation as a pastor and fulfilling the final requirement of this vocation with this internship.  It will be his calling to be with you in times of sorrow and struggle, to call you to repentance and faith when you wander from the truth, to remind you to be in the Lord’s house on the Lord’s day when other pursuits would fill your time, to call you to hope when tears fill your eyes and death comes near, to pray for you and with you that God’s will may be done on earth as it is in heaven, and to wield the staff of God’s Word when enemies of the kingdom torment you.  He will be an advocate so that you may be delivered safely to everlasting light and life.

Pentecost is an awesome day.  It is the day full of grace in which we rejoice in the God who keeps all His promises, who does not leave us to our own devices but directs us by His Word and Spirit, and who stands us up and out as witnesses before the world of all that God has done to save us.  On this day you receive the service of a new individual, a vicar, who will learn the pastoral office by being among you and serving you with the Word of God.  It is a day in which the focus is not on you or on Vicar Owen but on Christ who said this is what He would do and the Spirit who comes in Christ’s name to accomplish what He has promised.

You are so valuable to God that He will not leave any thing to chance.  He has saved you by His grace, forgiven you all your sins, given you new birth in baptismal water, fed and nourished you with His Body and Blood, and directed you with the living voice of His Word.  He remains in your midst as the Holy Spirit who points you to Christ and all He has done.  He has established the pastoral office through which He continues to speak of His mighty deliverance.  He has raised up good men to continue to stand among you in Christ’s name. 

But you are also paracletes sent to be witnesses in the world.  As the Father has sent Christ, Christ has sent you that in your homes, workplaces, neighborhoods, and across the world His Word may be spoken, people called to faith, His own sustained in trial, and the work of redemption come to its fulfillment.

This is how Pentecost continues its miracle right here and right now.  May the Lord keep you holy and blameless until the day of His coming and may the Spirit be your advocate, helper, and comforter, to bring to completion what Christ has begun in you.  Now, and forevermore.  Amen.

What we cannot do. . .

I read a long article in The Atlantic suggesting that the best way to deal with the sex abuse scandal in Roman Catholicism is to eliminate the priesthood.  Interesting.  Perhaps some Protestants would agree.  Apparently some Roman Catholics do.  But his answer is goofy on a variety of fronts.  Yet he is not the first.  Some Lutherans are screwing up on such things as well.  We often take the things of God as mere suggestions rather than God telling us this is how He works.

We have the Word and Sacraments and the Pastoral Office because God ordained us to have them and so they are not optional.  These do not belong the bene esse of the Church but of its esse.  We cannot eliminate them because they are not ours.  They belong to the Lord.  Because they are His, we cannot tinker with them either.  They belong to the Lord.  He gives them to us not as possessions to do with as we please but as the means of grace through which He does what He has promised to do.

A former priest and liberal Roman Catholic is absurd to suggest this as a fix for Rome's problems and Lutherans who feel sympathy are just as absurd in their pursuit of a church in which the means of grace play a peripheral role instead of the central role within the life of the church and God's people.  Yet that is exactly what is happening in some Lutheran congregations.  Holy Communion is moved from its central place to a non-Sunday spot which says to everyone this is not important.  In place of the Lord's Supper, entertainment and extended so-called sermons or teaching is made the center of everything.  I say so-called because these sermons focus not on sin and forgiveness or Christ's death and resurrection, but on tips for daily living, for achieving your goals, for finding happiness, and for improving your lot in life.

Baptism must compete with decisions for Jesus as the place where Christian life begins.  Instead of God acting to connect the sinner to the death and resurrection of Jesus, the focus is on an emotional commitment or decision to be God's and to live as His child.  Confession and absolution are nowhere to be found or are transformed from the concrete words of sin and thought, word, and deed, to failing to be true to self or living an authentic life.  The minister becomes equipper of those who actually do the ministry.  You must have seen those church bulletins in which the members are listed ministers of the congregation.

The liturgy is nowhere to be found and the appeal to adiaphora justifies ignoring all that we have been bequeathed by those who went before us.  Even hymns are replaced with songs with a short shelf life and designed less for people to sing than for a few singers to serenade the audience.  In all of these instances the means God appointed have been cast aside for the inventions of man.  In the end, what is really surrendered is the church.  We forget that the Church has absolutely no authority to depart from the Word or Sacraments or abandon the pastoral office for apart from these there is no Church.  The Church does not make the means of grace but the means of grace bring the Church into being

I obviously have an opinion about requiring celibacy but I cannot imagine how you abolish the priesthood in Roman Catholicism.  I do think it is convenient and easy to forget that the sex abuse scandal was primarily not about men who preyed on women or girls but men who preyed on boys and young men.  In any other world except the one in which we live today the suggestion might be made that homosexuality in the priesthood is part of the problem.. Even then, it must be said that there are priests who are gay but celibate, single, and chaste.  It is a dead end hunt to blame clericalism or the inability to marry as the reason for the scandal.  That does not mean that clericalism is not bad or that obligatory celibacy for the priesthood is as to be as it is; it only means that neither of these are primary, secondary, or even tertiary contributors to the scandal of abuse.  We need to stop blaming the things we don't like for the things that go wrong and begin looking honestly both for causes and solutions.  Clericalism and celibacy did not cause the sex abuse scandal.  The liturgy is not the reason people are not flocking to the church.  The church is not free to move the means of grace to the sideline in favor of something they think more relevant or effective.  Let us begin the discussion by at least admitting these truths.

Free to be?

The whole concept of freedom is troublesome for Christians.  For freedom Christ has set you free, says the Scriptures.  But what does St. Paul mean?  Today it has come to mean personal autonomy.  Even Christians have bought into the idea that freedom means submission to none, even God's Word is merely a suggestion.  We are the arbiters of truth whose reason says that Scripture says or means.  We are the judges over all things using experience and feelings to define fact.  We are the autonomous people whose desires are the face of our identity, public and private.  We are the rulers of our bodies and the controllers of our lives -- lived in the pursuit of a happiness which is most of all absolute freedom.  But what has this to do with the freedom St. Paul speaks about and Jesus bestows (John 8)?  The answer is not much.

Even in somewhat orthodox churches, the elephant in the room that dare not be acknowledged is that we defer to the autonomy of self over just about everything else in life.  Our children are being schooled in this philosophy in nearly every aspect of public education, the media has painted this as the most important cause for us and for our society, and our culture parades it as the ultimate goal of our lives and the shape of our pursuit of happiness.  It would be foolish to suggest that even in orthodox Christian congregations the folks in the pews are somehow immune from the influence or temptation of this pernicious lie.  Survey after survey suggests that the world is doing a better job of peddling the illusion of the autonomous self than the church is doing of speaking of submission to Christ, family, and neighbor.

What modern man has come to define as freedom is a life without restrictions, duties, or obligation except to the self.  So the university's job is to provide an atmosphere in which the student is free from encountering anything that might offend their autonomous self or challenge this idea of freedom.  The ultimate goal of the sexual revolution is sex without procreation, without commitment, without judgment, without obligation, even without definition (the gender of the moment), and without the surrender of any of the autonomous self in the process.  Abortion is where this is confronted but it is not the big issue.  Women to men to children to youth to feminist to GLBTQ, personal autonomy must rule over all things.  The end result of this is not community but isolation, not connection but individuality, and the personal space of the screen in your hand has become the domain in which this freedom is lived out most of all.

Christianity is not fighting against abortion but against a false and misleading dream of freedom which is, in reality, our greatest prison.  It was this idea that hid behind Eve's hand reaching for the fruit and Adam's willingness to join in the first sin and it was this that showed itself when they saw each other for the people they had become.  Perhaps it was near enough to God so that they still cared about their conscience enough to run and hide and deflect the blame when God came calling.  Today, it seems, we live under no such illusions that personal autonomy needs to be hidden or that we might be embarrassed about the idea of personal freedom which presumes we are gods.

What Christianity has become is the tepid water of a baptism which has only the power to affirm what comes to that water, absolution which declares the sinner just because there is no such thing as sin, a Eucharist in which we eat what we think it is and drink what we want it to be, and a Bible which has only the vaguest direction for our lives except to tell us God wants us to be happy, to enjoy and indulge our desires, and to be free to deal with the consequences however we feel is right at the moment.  This is the shadow that threatens to engulf Christian preaching and teaching and against which we must stand resolute.  God has spoken.  We repeat back to Him what He has said.  The Spirit is at work in the speaking.  In baptism the walking dead are killed once for all so that they may be made completely new in Christ.  In confession we speak of the daily battle with the old Adam still in us and the Christ who is also in us so that guilt and sin may not imprison us still.  In the Sacrament of the Altar we come not only to eat and drink but to discern and appreciate the foretaste of the heavenly and eternal feast.  For this battle, worship and catechesis are not less important but centrally so, for without them we are too easily surrendered to the idea that what God wants is what we want, that is, for the full enjoyment of our personal freedom so that we think, say, and do as we please.

Different Tongues, One Language

Sermon for the Feast of Pentecost, preached on Sunday, June 9, by the Rev. Daniel M. Ulrich.

    Language and words are important.  We need them to communicate, to understand one another.  Language and words can unite us.  But in today’s world we see that words are being redefined and given new meanings.  New words are even being made up.  This brings about confusion and conflict and division.  It’s hard to communicate today, to know what we can say and can’t say.  And if we can’t communicate, if we can’t speak to one another and understand what’s being said, then it’s impossible for us to be united.
    But this division of language and words wasn’t always the case.  At one point in our history everyone spoke the same language.  Everyone was unified in tongue and speech.  And to physically show this unity, the people planned to build a great city with a great tower reaching all the way to heaven.  The Lord, seeing what the people were doing, came down and stopped them by confusing their language so they couldn’t understand each other.  People opened their mouth and all that came out was babbling.  Unable to communicate they were confused and became separated. 
    As a child I had a hard time understanding the Tower of Babel.  Why didn’t God want the people to build that tower?  What was wrong with it?  Looking at the skylines of today, I couldn’t understand why these new tall buildings were okay, but the Tower of Babel wasn’t.  As I grew in my faith, I learned that it wasn’t the physical building that was the problem, but the people's’ attitude in building it.  Listen again to their motives for this building project.  They said, “Let us build ourselves a city and tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth” (Gn 11:4).
   The purpose of the tower was to make a name for themselves.  That is, they didn’t want to be known by God’s name, as His people.  Instead, they wanted to be their own.  They trusted in themselves.  They trusted in what they could do.  In their effort to reach heaven they wanted to do away with God and become their own gods.  This is nothing less than the sin of idolatry, the very same sin of our first parents in the Garden.  Adam and Eve ate the fruit because they wanted to be like God, they wanted to be their own gods.  And this is ultimately what all of our sin is as well.
   All sin is the breaking of the first commandment.  All sin is idolatry, because in all our sin what we’re really saying is God and His Word doesn’t matter to us.  Our sin is turned inward.  It’s all about us.  It’s about what we want as individuals.  It’s all about “making a name for ourselves,” doing what we want; living how we want; believing what we want to believe. 
   All of this has one effect, separation.  That’s what sin does.  It separates.  It divides.  It keeps us from being united with one another and with God.  Look at the effect of the Tower of Babel.  The people wanted to be unified in one place, but they ended up divided and dispersed all over the earth.  In the Garden, Adam and Eve were divided, they turned on each other, blaming each other for their sin.  And not only that, they were separated from God, banished from the Garden. 
   Our sin separates us.  It causes us to turn on one another.  Just look at the conflict we have in our world.  Look at the conflict that we have in our personal lives.  That’s our sin.  It keeps us from living together, unified, as God planned for us.  It keeps us from being unified with Him. 
Our sin keeps us from God who gives life.  He is the source of life, and when we’re separated from Him, we die.  The wages of sin is death because sin separates from God.
    We recognize we’re a divided people.  That’s an easy fact to see.  And for many of us, we’re tired of it.  We want to be unified.  We want peace.  We want to bring an end to division and separation.  So, we seek this unity by talking.   
It’s good to talk, to communicate with one another, to work together and come up with solutions to our problems.  But we must remember that ultimately, we can’t come up with a solution for our sin.  We can’t bring about true unity just through our words, because our words can’t fix our sin that separates us.  We can’t overcome sin by talking about it.  No, only God can overcome sin.  Only God can restore what’s been separated and divided.  And He does, through His Word incarnate, Jesus Christ our Savior. 
    It’s only through the forgiveness that Christ won for you on the cross that your sin is overcome.  Christ’s death undoes the death that your sin causes.  His forgiveness takes away your sin that separates you from God.  He brings you back to God the Father and restores that relationship.  He restores all your relationships with those around.  God unites us with Himself and with one another through His Gospel language, through the words of the Good News of Christ our Savior. 
At the Tower of Babel the people became divided in language, and on Pentecost the Lord fixed that, not by unifying tongues and making everyone's words and speech the same, but through the universal Gospel language. 
    It’s this language that unites all God’s people, whether they speak English, German, Russian, Swahili, Tanzanian, Chinese, Japanese, or any other language.  It’s this language that unites us together as God’s people, as His forgiven children, saved by Christ alone.  This language we all understand through the gift of faith by the Holy Spirit. 
    I personally haven’t worshiper in another language, but I know several people who have.  And when I’ve asked them about that experience, every single one has said the same thing; even though they might not have understood the exact words that were being said, they knew what was being spoken.  They knew when the pastor was speaking the Absolution.  They knew when Christ’s Words of Institution were said.  They knew when the Lord’s Prayer was prayed.  They knew these because they knew the universal Gospel language.  They knew their Savior and His salvation.
  Language has the power to divide and unite.  But no matter what physical language we speak, God unites all His baptized children together in the one Gospel language.  By this true and life giving Word of our crucified, risen, and ascended Lord, we’re united to our Savior, and with one another. 

Apologizing for Manwich. . .

Hunts, the maker of sauce for sloppy joes and condiments and other things, has apologized for its popular Manwich brand.  You know the one, a sandwich is just a sandwich but Manwich is a meal.  Okay, it it satire.  The Federalist has put out an over the top piece raising the question of how far all of this apologizing for being a man will go.  Read it here.

That said, it is beyond belief?  Of course not, that is the power of good satire.  It does not focus on the absurd that will never happen but the absurd that just might happen, especially given the direction of our culture today.  We live in a time when the assault on manhood has done an effective job of raising boys who are not men and shaming men who grew up from boyhood into manhood.  The antics of politicians and media figures in sexual abuse, rape, lewd conversation, preoccupation with games, and a life around a screen is not manhood's problem but boys who never grew to men and remain big children.  St. Paul says clearly that when he was a child, he spoke and acted like a child, but now he has grown up.  This grown up life is characterized not by satisfying desire or living out your identity through your desires but self-control.  It is not the living out of the flesh but life in the Spirit.  It is not living as a victim but as one made new in Christ to reign in desire and strive to live the holy life of faith in which love's duty to God is lived out in love's duty to family, neighbor, co-worker, and even stranger.

We do not have a man problem in this world.  We have a child problem.  Boys behaving badly, most especially by failing to grown up into men.  Tony Esolen has written a very good piece on this.  Read it.

We do not need more feminine men.  We need more men.  Period.  The names in the news and the bad behavior of those who should know better is not due to an unrestrained masculinity but a life stunted in childhood, without responsibility, a sense of duty, and the power to control desire.  It is not that boys have failed us or we have worse boys than we ever had.  The mechanisms of culture and community, yes, and church, have failed to train up and raise up these boys to men.  They have a terrible dearth of good role models, a limited number of mentors, and a host of other issues that have made maturing the exception rather than the rule.  We do not raise our boys to become men, husbands, fathers, community leaders, and examples of faith and virtue.  We raise them to remain boys and then looked shock when they act like boys.  For that matter, we do not raise our girls to become wives, mothers, community leaders, and examples of faith and virtue, either.  We raise all our children to believe that happiness is what you want it to be when you want it and that this is the highest and most holy goal of life -- one which God also wants for you.  Hogwash.

We don't people who will self-identify as male but real men and real women.  This has never been the exclusive content of our culture and community but it has always been the foundation and backbone of society.  If things are falling apart, it is not because we have too many manly men but too many big boys who are not real men.  The same is true of the Church.  We welcome any and all, sinners with all kinds of sins to be released from the prison of their sins and death sin has caused.  Not all will be married, nor will they look or act or sound the same.  Not all will be families, but all should find family within the household of God where desire is not what defines us and self-control is not an optional extra but the very essence of holy living.  This message is not anti anyone or any group but for the new life and the righteousness of that new life in which the lens through which we look is not our desires but Christ, maturing of faith, and holiness of life.  God help us raise up such men (and women!).

What does he mean and does it matter?

Sometime ago in a discussion with other Lutheran pastors, the subject of mission came up.  A voice asserted that it was not our job to grow the Church but simply to tell the message of Jesus.  Others added to the scandal of mission that actually expected a congregation or community of faith around Word and Sacrament to be the outcome.  No, it was said, it is enough in mission to bring people to Jesus.  Give them food, fellowship, a welcome, and show them you love them and they will see Jesus.

When some of us complained that bringing people to Jesus implies bringing people to a place where Jesus is accessible, as He has promised, in the Word that does what it says and in the Sacraments that deliver what they sign, we were told we were being sectarian.  Yet the conversation continued.  If we bring people to Jesus, what then?  Where do we leave them?  With the germ of a faith and no means of grace to bring that to fruition?  Was not Saul quickly catechized and then departed for a time for a more intense instruction and formation in the faith?  Where was he in this time apart?  Was he on his own in the wilderness?  Or was he with the household of disciples, learning from them and growing in grace and favor with the Lord through the means of grace?  Read it yourself.  Ananias was not so keen on his role as catechist but the Lord prevailed over him.  Barnabas walked with him on the way talking about what, the weather?  Read Acts 9. 

Paul did the same for those whom he brought up in the faith, those to whom he became a father in the faith.  There was no early version of the sinner's prayer, a life dedicated to the Lord, and then the folks went back home.  Read Acts 2.  What happened after Pentecost.  They continued in the apostles' doctrine, fellowship, prayer, and Eucharist.  Was this simply a ritual soon to be abandoned and they went off on their own to live out life with Jesus in the spirit?  Or was this the very pattern of Christian life from the beginning?  The notion that you can bring people to Jesus and not leave them within the community of faith where Christ is voice in His Word, absolver of sins in confession, baptizer in water by the Spirit, and priest and victim in the breaking of bread/Eucharist is hogwash.

Yet none other than Pope Francis has picked up on this blather.  Apparently a month or son ago he ad libbed in a prepared address to warn of the danger of proselytism. There is a danger that is popping up again - it seems overcome, but it pops up again: confusing evangelization with proselytism. No. Evangelization is testimony to Jesus Christ, dead and risen. It is He who draws in. This is why the Church grows by attraction, and not by proselytism.  But what does he mean?  Is Rome in danger of pushing people against their will or threatening them into conversion?  Is that a real danger among any major Christian group today?  I think the danger is timidity rather than the pursuit of those not of the household of God.  I only wish we had to warn people to be less enthusiastic in their witness for the faith and their pursuit of those who do not yet believe in Jesus Christ.  I have not witnessed that problem in Rome or in my own church.  Just the opposite.  Yet Pope Francis has joined the bandwagon and raised up the old canard about the difference between bringing people into the church and bringing them to Jesus.  Admittedly, this is the not the precise theological language we ought to be using for all of this but let that pass for the moment.

... the presence, the concrete presence, through which they ask you why you are this way. And then you proclaim Jesus Christ. It is not seeking new members for this ‘Catholic society,’ no, it is showing Jesus: that He should show himself in my person, in my behavior; and with my life opening up spaces for Jesus. This is evangelizing. And this is what your founders had in their hearts.  Hmmmmm.  What does Francis mean?  Is the Roman Catholic church merely a society with members or does it believe it is the body of Christ?  Do we Lutherans believe that we are merely an external organization that only bears slight resemblance to the Church or do we believe that where two or three are gathered in Christ's name (meaning where Christ's Word and Sacraments and, by implication, ministry are present) there is Christ the head and His body the Church (at least as much of that body as we can see with our eyes)?  Did St. Paul live waiting for people to see in his life evidence of Jesus to prompt their question or did he go to the synagogues proclaiming to those who had not yet heard or to the altar of the unknown God to reveal Him who had made Himself known in Christ?

What about faith comes by hearing the Word of God?  Is imitation of life the only tool for the Church's witness?  Really, how goofy it is when people presume that to preach Jesus is overkill and the passive evidence of a Christian life is all that God intended!  Pope Paul VI, not one of my favorite fellows, also appealed to holiness of life and the silent witness of example and yet he did so understanding this was not sufficient.  Nevertheless this always remains insufficient, because even the finest witness will prove ineffective in the long run if it is not explained, justified - what Peter called always having ‘your answer ready for people who ask you the reason for the hope that you all have’ - and made explicit by a clear and unequivocal proclamation of the Lord Jesus. The Good News proclaimed by the witness of life sooner or later has to be proclaimed by the word of life. There is no true evangelization if the name, the teaching, the life, the promises, the kingdom and the mystery of Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God are not proclaimed.

Nobody is advocating arguing people into the Kingdom or that human effort alone brings people to the knowledge of the truth but we are witnesses in word and in deed and God has promised to work through this witness and therefore we had better be faithful and fervent in the preaching of Christ and in the living of the holy life worthy of our baptismal calling.  That is what Lutherans ought to be saying, what Pope Francis ought to be saying, and what all orthodox Christians ought to be saying.  Of this, there is not enough.  Christians strive less for holiness of life than to fit into their culture (at least most of those in the West).  Christians are fearful of speaking boldly Jesus Christ and Him crucified because they fear being rejected, persecuted, or labeled as voices of hate.  These are a greater danger than proselytism.  

Interesting. . .

There was a time when in my Synod when there were a greater number of national leaders, men who were well known to the people of our church.  They were people of stature and most of them were parish pastors or pastors who had broad parish experience before taking positions out of the parish and on one administrative level or another.  They were people whose past was well known to the church.  They were certainly not perfect people or perfect leaders but we knew who they were.  We had respect for them, sometimes grudging respect. 

Today we live at a time when there are fewer national leaders of stature.  They can be invented, as some have, and we certainly do have the media to invent leaders.  But when it comes to the pew, it is harder than ever for folks to name even one Lutheran leader.  In my own parish, the folks who still look for that kind of leader are first prone to name Oswald Hoffmann (Lutheran Hour Speaker) as much as anybody.  Even Concordia Seminary President Dale Meyer is know more by his tenure as LH Speaker than as leader of the Synod's flagship seminary.  Sorry, Dale.  That is just how it seems to go.

Now this might be a mere curiosity except that when it comes to electing leaders for our church, we are left with a small number of regional names with limited regional identities or people we do not know at all.  Of course, parish pastors are not quite in the same boat but even then we know fewer and fewer folks directly and more and more simply by reputation.  I have watched this happen on the national stage for a while now.  It is also now happening on the District stage.  The leaders we do seem to know are those who have served in the District Office more than they have distinguished themselves as parish pastors.  I do not mean to cast broad aspersions against those whose longer service has been in administrative positions but neither do I mean to suggest that these are our better group of leaders. 

I read recently where an ELCA midwestern synod has elected a woman as bishop who has served a year here and there in the parish and that is the extent of her parish experience.  Curious.  They voted to unseat one bishop to elect her (who had been one of his assistants) and she without much of a resume except administrative work under the bishop now unelected.  I would not be surprised if something as odd has happened in Missouri.  I am not pointing fingers at the ELCA but wondering why a group of parishes would choose someone without much of any parish experience to be the bishop, some would say the chief pastor of the district?  Without even knowing who she is or who the bishop is whom she unseated and presuming all things were equal here, why is substantial parish experience not a requirement of those who serve in the role of episcope (overseer, bishop)?

Have these offices become so administrative that it matters little to us how much the candidates know or have experienced about parish life?  That could be one answer.  Do we know so little about those who would be our leaders and have so few that we do not have a great number of choices?  That could be another answer?  Do we care?  That is the answer I fear most of all.  I fear that we elect people mostly because parishes (both pastors and lay) feel they have no real stake in it all and really do not think it matters much.  If that is the case, then we are in bigger trouble than I thought.  Living in isolation from one another, insulated from issues and challenges beyond the local arena, and facing the temptation to hunker down and deal with our own back yards only, well, these are the ingredients of a recipe to disaster -- as if we did not have enough to challenge us! 

Now more than ever we need faithful leaders, faithful LUTHERAN leaders, who know Scripture and the Confessions, who have broad parish experience (and some administrative experience as well) who will stand up and stand out in a world telling us Christians that we should neither be seen nor heard outside of Sunday morning.  Pray for such leaders.  Look for them.  Elect them.  Listen to them.  Hold them accountable.  Be prepared to be held accountable by them.  Although I am thinking primarily here of Districts and their leadership, it applies equally to the national scene.  We cannot afford invented leaders nor can we profit from those who run against someone.  We have seen what the politics of division have done to our nation.  Is this where we want to go as a church?

Good people, bad choices. . .

Living as we do in a lawless world in which morality is but one person wide and one moment deep, we may be tempted to think that what we need is a robust witness to the Law of God.  Now I am certainly not one to deny the faithful proclamation of the commands of God, I am not sure that the problem we face is due to a lack of the Law or that it can be remedied by the application of the Law.  It is my conviction that the problem lies a step before the Law, at the stage of original sin.  I am even more and more of the conviction that the denial of original sin is even more insidious than the rejection of the idea of or submission to the Divine Law.

Many years ago some folks in my parish asked to read together Rabbi Kushner's then popular book When Do Bad Things Happen to Good People.  It was rather clear at the time that people were having difficulty believing that people were not basically good but made poor choices.  While none of them would admit to a denial of original sin, it was the effective reality.  They did not want to believe that sin had so pervaded the human condition that the premise of Kushner;s book was false.  There were no good people.  Oh, to be sure, there are folks who appear to be better than others and who, in comparison, are better.  This is what Luther calls civil righteousness.  Yet even this is not what the folks were getting at.  Sin was outside them, a choice made and not an intrinsic reality.  In the end, we finally did prevail that the Biblical doctrine of original sin was true even if it was not at that time apparent to the eye.

That was more than 25 years ago and long before 9-11, school shootings, GLBTQ agendas, terrorist threat, and a host of other violent and shocking assaults upon our national and individual psyche.  Now you might think that it would be easier rather than more difficult to believe in original sin today.  But the reality is that somehow we have so fully incorporated our idea of goodness betrayed by poor choices or corrupted by poor environment that original sin is well off our radar.  Those who perpetrate such violence began life as good kids until poor parents, poverty, poor ideology, or a host of other circumstances enticed them to the dark side.

In the baptismal liturgy the Church speaks of the child as under the power of the devil until Christ claims them as His own.  It remains one of the most shocking statements of the liturgy.  How can we say that while staring into the face of innocence?  At that point, every child's future seems filled with promise and hope -- like the hopes and dreams of mom and dad holding the child in their arms.  It is a statement we take by faith when eyes see only the sweet face of a baby.  Even then, it is a truth we find not only hard to see but distasteful to believe.

Is it that we have heard the Law of God and reject it or is it that reject before that the premise of original sin?  We cannot believe, for example, that our desires can lie to us or our feelings cannot be trusted.  We are sure that these are the most reliable voices of all.  Sin has to be a matter of unwise choices or a poor environment growing up.  We are not perpetrators of evil but its victims.  We do not need direction from God or even conviction but acceptance and approval.  The Law is for others but we do not need it.  The Law exists when upbringing or choices fail us but that is about all we need it for -- for exceptions not for rules. So could it be that our world is lawless because we believe that we are good, the nearly everyone is good, and that wrong can be explained and treated more than punished?  Could it be that we appreciate Jesus more for being selfless than the Savior who suffers in our place for our sin, more for His compassion and refusal to judge than His life of righteousness?  Could it be that Jesus has become merely an inspirational leader whose example is admired even if it is not emulated?

Strange but true. . .

You may have thought Planned Parenthood was a victim, a small operation facing off against the well financed and highly organized Pro-Life Movement.  Funny though, because in reality Planned Parenthood actually ranked 27 on Forbes magazine’s list of the 100 largest charities for year 2018 (total annual revenues of $1.46 billion).  The reality is just the opposite.  The Pro-Life movement is a hodgepodge of local organizations, mostly volunteers, without a centralized structure.  It is up against a "charitable" behemoth that has a government income stream, well placed media support, and a long list of celebrities to stand with them.  So, the next time it seems like women are living under threat from a giant male dominated and well financed threat, look behind the headlines.  In reality, it is a miracle the Pro-Life cause has survived, flourished, or found a way to threaten the Pro-Abortion lobby.

But there is one additional ally of the Pro-Abortion movement.  That is the appeal of the so-called right for bodily autonomy that has found an overlap between the choice people (and Planned Parenthood) and the GLBTQ lobby.  We apparently have a right to define ourselves, our gender, our sexuality, our reproductive freedom, and our desires.  It is not only that we have this right, but this is THE right above all rights, the one that goes to the heart and core of our lives and happiness.  I wish I were joking but I am not.  In a world filled with terrorist threat, violence upon our schools, poverty, hunger, lack of health care facilities and providers, the high cost of health care, and an aging population, the most central threat to women, according to Planned Parenthood and its minions, is any effort to curtail the unlimited freedom of bodily autonomy. 

Just something to upset you because that is all I can think of doing this morning.

A Wake Up Call. . .

I am coming up on my 40th seminary class reunion.  It is not that I look forward to such things but I am struck by how things have changed.  There were twice as many graduating from my seminary that year than both seminaries this year.  Eight years before that graduation day, there were literally hundreds upon hundreds of pre-sem students at St. John's College (where I attended) and its sister colleges throughout the LCMS.  Now there are not even be 100 pre-sems in all the Concordias combined (even though the Concordia University system has ballooned in size).  This is, by the way, not about nostalgia.  It is about what is happening to our shrinking numbers and why.

I wonder if the crisis of vocations for our church is not more self-inflicted than imposed upon us by cultural, economic, and social changes.  Yes, we live in a different world.  I know that.  But the factors which have contributed to the decline are not all external.  Some of them are internal.  Many of them.  So what has changed?

• We no longer esteem the pastoral office as highly as we once did.  We are quick to criticize pastors and complain about them.  Such conversations make a big impact upon a young man who may feel God's call but hears all around him negative talk about his pastor that he knows could all too soon be said about him.  Pastors are drains on church budgets and people are saying all over our Synod how we cannot afford them anymore.  Pastors need to be more than pastors but visionary leaders and agents of dynamic change to rescue a moribund church from itself.  It can be daunting to think that being a pastor means emceeing a religious variety show every week to entertain people into giving their money and making a return visit.
• We are confused about what it means to be a pastor.  A young man may not be sure he can live up to a modern day job description.  We are surrounded by conflicting ideas of what pastors are supposed to do and be.  Does he equip and delegate or do what is to be done?  Must he save the congregation, be solely responsible for making it grow, find a way to appeal to those not in the congregation on Sunday morning, and make the faith winsome to people spiritual but not religious?  He may not even realize that none of this is in the call -- which is about preaching, teaching, administering sacraments, visiting sick, shut-in, fallen away, sinners secure in their sins, burying the dead, praying, etc. . .
• We have decided to finance the ministry on the backs of those who desire to be pastors.  Yes, our seminaries are offering free tuition right now but there are still costs involved.  The undergraduate cost of a church college pre-sem program alone are daunting and have priced most out of the market (allowing our church schools to largely ignore what was once their core mission).  Then when they come out of seminary with debt, we pay them as if they were supposed to work for free.  Pastors have become budget busters for small congregations who either cannot or refuse to find ways to support the office.  Everyone else looks forward to retirement but we expect pastor's retirement to mean serving full-time for part-time pay in a congregation that cannot afford to pay them what they are worth.
• We don't think as much about education and training as we once did.  We have invented programs to churn out people who are just as good (perhaps better) but without residential seminary education.  Online programs that reduce the coursework to a minimum have become the drumbeat of our people and our leaders.  What that says to a young man considering the ministry is that it is no big deal, anybody can do it, it is not worth investing yourself into something as demanding as three years of classroom work and one year of internship.  Unless you have extra money and want to, this is an optional extra no longer esteemed as valuable except by old foggies like me and the seminaries themselves.
• We do not catechize at home like we once did.  Ask any confirmation class how many of their families even eat together much less pray before meals.  Our busy lives and filled schedules have spilled over onto our children's lives and we have squeezed out any room for a prayer life or devotional life as a family or as an example to our children.  Sure, this is not true of all but it is more true of most than it once was.  Time is our most valuable commodity and we show what is valuable by how we spend our time.  Work and pleasure come first for most of us.  God and church compete for the leftovers.  Plus we have set a poor example by attending church every other week or once a month and calling it faithful.  Even if our family does not do this, it does not take much for a young man to look around and see who is missing from the pews or Sunday school classes half the time or more (assuming they still attend Sunday school).
• We don't know our church music and we are too cheap to pay a decent organist so music is no longer the faithful handmaiden of the Word in many congregations.  We press the play button and music flows from speakers.  Or we have a praise band and a playlist drawn not from the sturdy hymns of old or the solid hymns of more recent vintage but the pop gospel hits of the latest contemporary music station that come and go with the style.  So we carry around in our minds and ears little of the hymns that actually teach the faith.  Instead church music has fallen victim to personal preference and become like muzak playing behind the scenes of our lives.

You can argue with me if you want, but I wonder if some of these are not more influential in the decline of those who feel the call and go through the preparation to become the pastors of the church.  Far from being simply the press of culture outside the building or the growing disdain of orthodox Christianity, these factors are what our young men live with in the home and at church.  It is hardly a rich environment for us to raise up good and faithful men for the most noble calling of all.  So we can complain about how few graduate from seminary but it is not the seminary's fault and we cannot even blame the world around us.  But if we would look into the mirror, we just might see what has brought us to this moment.

Renewing our Church. . .

Over the years nearly everyone in our church has heard the horror stories of our decline and been warned by a future that does not look good.  We have suffered through program after program to reverse the decline.  We have seen our church fractured by different voices leading us in different directions.  We have watched as the number of seminarians has dropped, alternatives to residential seminary education been proposed and adopted, and lay deacons offered to replace pastors.  We have been caught in the firing line between those who say we are not growing because we are too Lutheran and those who say we are not Lutheran enough.  Our once vaunted system of parochial schools from preschool to university has suffered until a Lutheran elementary school is a unusual and a Lutheran High School rare.  In the midst of all of this, we find ourselves in the midst of another election cycle in which the powers at play on several fronts have attempted to demonize some and canonize others as if a Synod President or a convention will make or break who we are.

My perspective has changed over the years.  I do not expect a national leader to be our savior or a convention or several of them to affect dramatically the future of our church body for the better.  We have, for example, had resolutions adnauseum about the boilerplate things of more frequent communions, the riches of hymnal and liturgy, the worth of Lutheran schools, etc... but these have not succeeded in changing the landscape.  We have had program after program, from the official ones with a St. Louis imprimatur to parachurch offerings and still we find ourselves under the same gun, facing the same problems, and looking for new or better programs that will succeed where the old ones failed.

If we are to change our church, I firmly believe it will come through the men we raise up, train up, and hold up to the church as pastors.  When we send the brightest and best to be formed as pastors and equipped with the knowledge and trained in the skills of the pastoral office, we are making for a lifetime of change as these faithful individuals work on the ground preaching, teaching, presiding, praying, and leading God's people.  When we send forth those who are convinced of our doctrine, who are well versed in Scripture, who have confidence that God acts through the means He has promised, we put into place those who have the best opportunity to shape us now and in the future for the kind of success God wills and we yearn for in our congregations and the ministries that extend from them and are supported through them.

We may not yet be at a place where we face a shortage of pastors and are in crisis mode because of it, but we are certainly already at that place where it is easy to see the difference when good and faithful pastors enter the church ready, willing, and able to be unashamedly Christian and unapologetically Lutheran in their words and works.  I have seen it at work in congregations around me and I have seen it at work across the landscape of our church body.  If you want to renew our church and revitalize our work for God's kingdom, it cannot begin without attention to the best and brightest in the seminary who are set apart by Word and prayer for the holy office of the ministry.  Programs have a limited lifespan and influence and pastors have a longer period of service and a greater influence.  I vote to put our revitalization monies and energies more fully into more and better candidates for the ministry and use the funds that would go toward other things to support the cost of their education at the seminary and make sure they earn a living wage in the parish so that they are fully free to focus on God's work. 

The glory You gave me, I have given you. . .

Sermon for Easter 6C, the Sunday after the Ascension, and the occasion of the Retirement of our Cantor, Rocky Craft, after 22 years of service, preached on Sunday, June 2, 2019.


Jesus said, “The glory that you have given me I have given to them. . . that they may be one.” 

The sad truth is that despite all our technological tools, we tend to live somewhat solitary lives.  The chronic condition of people today is loneliness.  We have been imprisoned by our technology, alone with our ear buds and play lists and screens.  If it is true that we feel distant from one another, this it is certainly true that we feel distant from God.  At its root the problem is not simply technology but us. It is sin.

Though the incarnation of our Lord in our flesh and blood was meant to break through the barriers that divided us from God, sin had so stolen our hearts and muted our voices that it would require nothing less than the Holy Spirit to prompt us to faith, teach our voices to sing, and lead us from the shadows of fear into the bright light of Christ our Savior.  This Sunday fits into that time of waiting when Jesus has ascended and the Spirit has not yet come, at least on our church calendar.  And it feels like that.  Like we are without the presence of Jesus to fill our eyes and the Spirit to fill the emptiness within.

Into this Jesus prays.  He prays not that we would be happy or satisfied or live long and well but that we might be one.  He prays that He might fill our loneliness and our longing so that we would venture forth from our retreats and refuges into the glorious presence of God.  That is what we do here, each Sunday.  We come from our homes and enter into the presence of the Most High, where, surprise after surprise, He serves us with His gifts and grace in Word and Table.

The glory that Jesus was given by the Father is the glory He gives to us here and now – not fully but in anticipation of the fullness to come.  We receive it in part with our eyes but mostly with by faith.  Hidden in water is baptismal power to join us to Christ’s death and resurrection so that we might be His own. Apart from the tyrrany and uncertainty of feelings, our life with God rests in His act and promise in water given life by the Spirit. 

The glory that Jesus was given by the Father is the glory that we hear not simply in our ears but with hearts that recognize in the voice of the Gospel the Good Shepherd who lays down His life for His sheep.  We hear His voice and know His voice and He knows us and leads us and we follow Him.  God’s Word is the unchanging voice that actually delivers what it says. 
It speaks and we are granted forgiveness of our sins.  It speaks and we are called to life stronger than death.  It speaks and our hearts burn with desire for that which is good and right and true, as laid out for His in His perfect Law.

The glory that Jesus was given by the Father is given to us in the Table where Jesus is priest and food, where He delivers to us the Lamb of God that fulfills the promise of Passover and fills us with the foretaste of the eternal feast to come.  Our hunger for God’s good gifts is whetted by the promise hidden in bread and wine, the very body and precious blood of Christ.  We come to the honored places prepared for us to eat as invited but unworthy guests, who marvel at God’s mercy.

And then what?  How do we respond to such grace and glory?  From ancient times the presence of the Lord has caused His people to erupt in song.  With a voice of singing, we receive His glory and give it witness to the world.  Moses taught the people to sing when God gave them deliverance from Egypt.  With Job we sing “I know that my Redeemer lives.”  With the Psalmist, we recount the marvelous works of God and give voice to the liturgy of what God has done to save us.  With Mary we magnify the Lord for the unspeakable joy of God who dwells in us.  With the angels, we sing “Glory to God in the Highest and peace to His people on earth.” With the heavenly court, with cherubim and seraphim, with angels and archangels, we sing, “Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of Sabaoth.” 

Singing unites our voices as one.  It gives our silent lips a cause.  It manifests here on earth, the hidden unity we have in God.  Music is, as Luther said, the handmaid of the Word.  Where God’s Word lives, God’s people sing.  Within that song of praise, our loneliness is transcended and our solitude is broken, and as much as is possible this side of glory, the prayer of Jesus is fulfilled among us.  “Make them one.”  God’s gift is music and its purpose is His praise and its fruit is joy as we give thanks for all that the Lord has done.

Rocky, for 22 years you have lead our praises, directed our voices, accompanied our song, sounded the trumpet to rally us to the cause of God and His glory.  You have not only taught us to sing but given us the opportunity to listen into the voices of the choirs who sing their praises to God and inspire, encourage, and uplift our faith.  You have pushed us past the comfortable and easy, into the work of worship and for the best for God’s glory in a magnificent pipe organ.  God worked through you and we are so grateful for your presence and partnership these 22 years. 
We cannot help but sing.  The Lord has done marvelous things.  It is impossible to stand silent before such abundant grace.  It is impossible to be born anew in baptismal water and be made new people in Christ without also being moved to sing our thankful response.  It is impossible to receive forgiveness of our sins without returning the song of praise.  It is impossible to hear God’s Word and not sing “Glory to You, O Lord.”  It is impossible to be fed and nourished at the Lord’s table without singing with Simeon, “Lord, now let Your servant depart in peace.”  God has given us music as a gift and Rocky as the teacher, leader, and accompanist of our song. 

How can I keep from singing?  That is the question that haunts a people who have seen the works of the Lord in their midst, who have been comforted in moments of sorrow, who have been calmed in turmoil, who have been encouraged in despair, who have been strengthened in temptation, and who have been given hope even in death.  We do not sing because we are happy or because it is our job, but because it is our duty and delight.

The song of faith unites our many voices into one, it transcends time and culture, and it anticipates the eternal future that God has prepared for us.  Jesus has made known the glory of the Father and delivered that glory into our midst.  He does so every Sunday.  And from that awesome encounter with the eternal God and His precious gifts, we sing.  We sing back to God the Word that He has made known to us.  And though the day comes when we depart God’s house and our formal time together comes to an end, we carry this song of grace with us as we go, wherever we go, until that day when we are reunited to sing in the heavenly places the blessed song of God’s saving works and our gratitude for all that He has done.

With all the Church, with the apostles and prophets, with the saints and martyrs, with the angels and archangels, with all those who have gone before and those still about us in flesh, we sing: “We praise You and acknowledge You, O God, to be the Lord.”  Others will come to continue what Rocky has done among us and for us, but the song of faith will not end.  It will sound above the sound of destruction when this heaven and earth must give way to the new heaven and earth that is eternal.  It will sound as we pass through the gate of death and the grave to our own joyful resurrection with Christ.  It will sound in Revelation’s heavenly courts where Christ is life and light, the Lamb and the Temple, and death is no more.  Rocky, thank you.  Thank you, and God bless you.  We praise God for you. Amen.

Lutheran reverence. . .

After Mass, I attended a Lutheran service with my sister’s family and it was more reverent without Jesus’s actual presence!  So went a comment on a Roman Catholic blog that often complains about liturgical anomalies and issues.  The blogmaster's response:  What strikes me in this is your observation that the Lutheran service was more reverent than the Mass you went to.

For now I will skip the part about without Jesus' actual presence and go to the core of his observation.  Reverence.  The truth is that the vast majority of Lutheran parishes (my experience here is almost exclusively LCMS) have a very reverent Sunday morning Divine Service, following the outline of the Lutheran Service Book (even if it is printed out in the service folder).  That IS who we are.  Lutherans have from the beginning been concerned about the Gospel and not about making our encounter with Christ through the Word and Sacraments more homey or casual or easy.  Our concern is for liturgy that reflects the faith and preaching that preaches Christ crucified and risen for the forgiveness of our sins, for the grace of new life now, and for the gift of everlasting life.  It should not be a surprise that Lutherans are reverent.  It has always been who we are.  Early on Lutherans were concerned that Sunday morning not be a free for all or chaotic but orderly and ordered according to the ancient mass form that we acknowledged as our own as much as Rome's.

That said, the majority of people probably attend an LCMS congregation in which at least one of the options is a so-called contemporary service of one sort or another.  Some of these are less objectionable -- substituting some pop gospel songs for hymns -- but other forms are so adulterated that it is impossible to see anything Lutheran in them -- they are copies of the latest and greatest stuff used in non-denominational or evangelical entertainment services.  So the majority of our congregations use the hymnal but the majority of our people are subject to at least one version of something not in the hymnal (even if they do offer traditional services as well).  I hear this complaint all the time when our members go away on vacation or for business travel or move.  Pastor, where can I find a congregation like Grace?  Of course, they are referencing the seriousness with which we approach liturgy, a reverent service, majestic music, and solid Biblical preaching and teaching (along with a deliberate welcome to new people).  It should not have to be that way, but it is.  Nevertheless, I am heartened that one Roman Catholic noted more reverence among Lutherans than in his own church.

Without Jesus' actual presence is harder to unpack.  Is it that they attended a so-called dry mass or half mass in which Holy Communion was not offered or is it that they are referencing the fact that Rome does not consider Lutherans capable of having the Real Presence, what without apostolic succession and a rightly ordered ministry (by their definition) and the failing of not affirming transubstantiation.  I am not sure what he meant by that comment.  But if it was they he came to a service that ended abruptly at the offering and hastened to a closing prayer and benediction after starting off like the Divine Service, well, then, shame on the Lutherans.  This is not who we are, either.  We are reverent but our reverence is posited toward a vibrant and dynamic life of the Gospel faithfully preached and the Lord's Supper rightly celebrated, on every Lord's day and every other day communicants desire to receive it.  When Lutherans forget this and get into the habit of thinking of Holy Communion as an optional add-on to the preaching service, Lutherans are being false to their identity and confession.  It is not a matter of elevating one over the other (as a few charged in my previous post on the liturgical movement) but of Word AND Sacrament -- the Lord's day, house, Word, and Table!  That is who we are.  Period.

But. . . if it is a matter of a judgment that says Lutherans could not possibly have the real presence since their ministry is not rightly ordered, not in apostolic succession, and they fail to define that presence within the exclusive terminology of transubstantiation, then shame on Rome.  You obviously do not know who Lutherans are.  Our apostolic succession is a succession not merely of priestly order but pastor and people, clergy and community.  It is not that we have no bishops but plenty of them since we have defined the term in the manner of the early church and see every pastor as bishop in that place, finding the distinctions in jurisdiction to be of human origin and not divinely inspired.  Further, transubstantiation is for Lutherans too much baggage added onto the clear word of Scripture that after the consecration the bread, still bread, IS the Body of Christ (the crucified and risen Lord Jesus in flesh) and the wine, still wine, IS the Blood of Christ (shed for us on the cross for the forgiveness of our sins).  I fail to get why transubstantiation has to go with the Real Presence since the East does not define things in that way and their sacrament is valid (according to Rome).  I have no particular beef with transubstantiation except to say it adds too much to the simple word of Christ that this IS My body. . . this IS My blood.  For us Lutherans, the Sacrament is Christmas, Christ incarnate where He has promised to be (flesh and blood and Son of God in the manger and flesh and blood in bread and wine upon the altar).  That Lutherans are reverent should not surprise Rome because, if they knew us, they would know that we are reverent not toward symbol or sign but toward Christ whose voice speaks in His Word and whose flesh and blood are given and received in the Blessed Sacrament. 

Clericalism. . .

Pope Francis has long claimed that the sex abuse scandals within Rome had at least as much to do with clericalism as anything else, perhaps almost exclusively so.  It is his contention that when priests are placed on pedestals, they can get away with things they should not.  Perhaps he believes the same about bishops on their pedestals (though certainly not popes!).  This is an odd statement from a church body in which their is little semblance of democracy and, in nearly everything local, the priest rules, and in about everything else, the bishop, and above them all sits the man in the white cassock.  It is further presumed that this clericalism is a fruit of those who take the office more seriously, who are more traditional in style personally and liturgically.  Clericalism is a bad thing and the way to clean up the church, at least according to Francis, is to make it less clergy dominant.  In reality, those in favor of the Latin Mass, for example, cannot fairly be charged as clericalists.

The funny thing is that this same idea often gets pumped through the veins of Missouri Synod Lutherans.  Clericalism is a bad thing and pastors on their pedestals is a bad thing (Herr Pastor) and this clericalism is at the root of many problems in our own church body.  On the one hand you have had a person like Herman Otten who has insisted that clericalists devalue the voters' assemblies of the congregations and impose their rule on the laity, depriving them of their godly right to vote.  On the other hand, you have a certain party in Synod that likes to talk about unhealthy centralization, about the need for locals to make local decisions, of the need to abandon historic liturgical forms for the worship preference of the moment, and to leave all episcope to DPs and leave the SP out of it all.  We hear complaints against the hierarchical way our current SP works (instead of a more collegial system in which the Council of Presidents, our version of the college of cardinals, is treated as at least equal to the SP).  Strangely, many of these complaints have come from structural changes in which more power and authority was placed in the Synod President and his office by those who abandoned our older system of commissions and staff --  changes he did not favor but, surprise, he was elected to inaugurate.

As one who has been called brilliant on the pages of Otten's newspaper and at the same time been characterized by the worse possible charge -- being a hypo-euro-sacerdoctalist -- I find this somewhat odd.  The rather strange alliance between those trying to elect a DP or California Pastor and the weekly New Haven, Missouri, tabloid against those who uphold the Confessions, the Office, the orthodox Lutheran fathers, the historic church year, and the liturgy is hard to explain.  But if both groups are charging clericalism against the current SP and many who support him, it is a false charge.  While I have no doubt that there are plenty of pastors who might fit the definition of a clericalist, I submit that their positions on everything from the office itself to the liturgy have little to do with it. 

Is there anything more like clericalism than using pastoral prerogative to substitute an invented worship service each week over the liturgy?  Is there anything more like clericalism than presuming to know what Scripture should be preached instead of the church year?  Is there anything more like clericalism than insisting that vestments are not your personal style but polos and khakis are?  Is there anything more like clericalism than using non-constitutional or new constitutional means to self-perpetuating boards of directors and appointing paid staff to them?  Is there anything more like clericalism than governing the congregation like a CEO (the way so many Lutheran parachurch groups suggest)?  Is there anything more like clericalism than leading the congregation away from their identity as Lutheran or LCMS in favor of the current names du jour from evangelicalism?  Is there anything more like clericalism than abandoning the catechism in favor of something which emphasizes feelings over truth and reason over Scripture?

Not too long ago some complained about seeing clerical collars at the Synod convention or genuflection or too much from the hymnal.  Some complain that the Synod should fear those who wear a chasuble or elevate the host or kneel or ring bells or swing smells.  How foolish!  Our Synod is not in danger of losing our Lutheran identity from those who add to the historic liturgy or practice as Lutherans once were accustomed but she is in grave danger of losing her identity from those who abandon these things in favor of casual entertainmentfests in which the pastor is center stage complete with back up singers and look like the latest big box non-denominational church down the street.  Clericalism is alive and well but it cannot be equated with vestments or rubrics or those who follow them.  It is far more dangerous.  It makes personal preference the god of the moment and makes everything else subservient to this.

Although the common charge is clericalism, and the common enemy seems to be those on the more confessional and liturgical side of things, the charge cannot fairly be made against these folks but it might be more than I could hope for them to figure out the mistaken identity.

Music the handmaiden of the Word. . .

Who could imagine that the church that nurtured the faith of and raised up a parish musician the stature of Johann Sebastian Bach would find itself at a time when praise bands have minimized the role not only of the organ but congregational singing and CD players have replaced live bodies on the organ bench.  But, sadly, that is where we are.  Where the Reformation once sang its way into the hearts of the people as much as it was preached there, today the great Lutheran chorales have become more like museum pieces we honor while we spend our time on throwaway music on Sunday morning.  And who do we have to blame for it?  Perhaps it is ourselves.

On this day my parish will give thanks for the gift and service of a faithful cantor of 22 years.  He came when we had a broken down electronic organ and limited resources and opportunities but he has left us with a 65 rank pipe organ in the sanctuary, an 11 rank pipe organ in the chapel, two grand pianos, a clavinova, a well practiced church choir (adults), a range of youth and children's groups, handbell choir, and a musical tradition well know even throughout our region.  It was not all his doing but he was the one whose vision and whose leadership helped to create a climate for this to take place.  Before we retired Lutheran Worship, we had sung all but 12 hymns in that book.  He helped us learn unfamiliar tunes and lead us to see them become old friends.  When we introduced Lutheran Service Book, he was there to provide the confident trumpet sound to rally our voices toward that which was new and different.  I cannot tell you what a difference a good parish musician means.  But if you ask anyone in my parish, they will tell you it means everything!

A parish musician costs money.  But it is money well spent.  To paraphrase our Lord, you do not have because you do not pay for or value highly enough the person who leads from the organ bench.  It is not that there is no money.  It is that we have put other priorities over an organist and good parish music appropriate to our size.  We have plenty of money for the things we think are important or essential but we have largely deemed a good organist to be a luxury and non-essential part of our parish life.  It shows.  Some of what happens on Sunday mornings among us is downright embarrassing.  Our people do not sing, the music is poor, the instrument is cheap, and we do not view what happens on Sunday morning as source and summit for all that happens within the life of the congregation.  We have learned the terrible lesson of getting by.  We get by, as cheaply as possible, at least when it comes to worship.  And it shows.  It shows in the people who have learned from us that what happens on Sunday morning is not all that important.  It shows in the people who may visit once but who will not return; they are looking for something more eloquent (though not necessarily more elaborate!).

We pay our parish musician well though not enough for the things he has brought to us and the legacy he will leave when he retires.  The difficulty will come not in finding someone to play as well as he plays but in someone who shares his single minded commitment to do his best for the Lord week after week after week and whose personality invites others to join him in the holy endeavor of good and faithful church music to serve as faithful handmaiden to the Word of God read, preached, and taught.  I challenge every parish to look over the budget and see how little is usually spent on Sunday morning and to ask the hard questions of whether this is as it should be and whether this may be one reason why the congregation is not growing or even in decline.  Lutheranism has a history of producing profound church musicians and we also have a history both of undervaluing them and trying to pay them a pittance of what they are worth.  Even Bach had his problems there.

Today as we celebrate a Sunday filled with wonderful church music, choral anthems, hymns, and a variety of instrumentalists in support of the mighty pipe organ, I say a public thank you to the man who has taught us how important the commitment to good church music is to a flourishing congregation and how important it is to give your best for His glory!  Implicit in this is the challenge to us here and to the churches all over the world who claim the title Lutheran to invest in the best church music possible for God's glory (He deserves nothing but our best!) and for the benefit of our own life together around the Word and Table of the Lord.  Rocky Craft has taught me so much and has made my life as preacher and presider so much easier because I knew he was there on the organ bench.  I cannot imagine a Sunday without him but I am forever grateful for all the Sundays he has given us!  Well done, good and faithful servant of the Lord!

When no is the kinder word. . .

I reported some time ago that Pope Francis had decided to study the issue of women deacons.  It was for many an occasion of hope, those who felt that this was the time for a female diaconate and that Frank was the guy to make it all happen.  It was an occasion of angst for those who feared that the same pope was going to dismantle ages of tradition going back to the earliest days of the apostles.  It turned out worse than could be feared.  Frank did neither.  He held out an olive branch to those who wanted change and then, while the study was still going on, pulled the rug out from under it, leaving the study to continue under a somewhat dubious mandate.

Pope Francis said, “For example, the formulas of female deacon ‘ordination’ found until now, according to the commission, are not the same for the ordination of a male deacon and are more similar to what today would be the abbatial blessing of an abbess...”  In other words, different is not the same and certainly not the path to a female priesthood.  “For the female diaconate, there is a way to imagine it with a different view from the male diaconate,” Pope Francis said.  Again, go ahead and study but it will not come to a different conclusion than before (as recent as 2002, for example).

Now I have no skin in this game.  I am not Roman Catholic.  I would, however, hate to see Rome capitulate to the pressure of culture in this and abandon the theological reasons and Biblical cause for a male only office (remember Lutherans do not see a divine distinction between bishop and priest but merely a human one).  A female diaconate has the been the first opening of the door to a female priesthood and episcopate for every church that has gone there and it would make Missouri even more isolated (as it already is among Lutherans) for not ordaining women.  But I wonder if there is not a larger issue at work here.

When we study a question to which we already know the answer it does not help the church but wounds her.  I am not saying we should not restate our position over against new challenges but a study implies that we just might come to a different conclusion, that the question is a real question without a certain answer, and that there might be hope for those who disagree with tradition.  This is not merely foolish but dangerous.  It is a threat to the doctrinal unity and integrity of the church and, indeed, of the faith itself, to proceed with study after study as if there was no real answer or no abiding answer to the question.  It is a deception designed to placate those who want change but it will only alienate them and make it harder to convince them of the one and always answer.  Sometimes no is the kinder word than "let's see" -- children already know that so why don't the adults who are in charge of the structures of the church know that?  Finally, studies hang onto exception as evidence against the rule and presumption for changing the rule when everyone already knows that exceptions make terrible rules.  Exceptions are not analogies of how we might proceed but real exceptions.  We have had tons of them in Christian history and every time we presume to use those exceptions (to closed communion or regular ordination paths or liturgical order) we have ended up with chaos that had to be cleaned up by the next generation (hopefully it did not last any longer).

So if Frank were listening, I would say "let your no be no" (it sounds good and may even be Biblical).  And to those in my own church body I would say the same.  "Let your no be no."  Do not muddy the waters with endless studies on questions to which we already know the answers and do not give false hope to those who wish to come up with different answers than Scripture or tradition.  Yes, by all means, study how we can more effectively speak the answers to a new generation of ears unwilling to hear them but do not treat closed questions as open ones.  Tradition is not some burden of archaic or constrictive chain that we must cast off from time to time.  Tradition is the wise and practiced art of the saints who went before.  And, guess what, they learned much of it from what the Apostles said and did, and, they from the Lord Himself.  So when we dismiss something as merely apostolic custom or practice, we are being fools and opening up what should be received with joy and passed on faithfully.  We are inviting confusion and chaos.  That is what Frank did and what churches so often do. 

When the church begins a study, the most routine result is a departure from Scripture and Tradition.  And, if this is the goal, do everyone a favor by announcing that first.  Don't put on your pious face and head to the library as if somehow we were really looking for an answer to a question that does not have one.  No is the kinder word to those who advocate for such things as the ordination of women.  It is clear in a world filled with the fog of doubt and uncertainty.  The integrity of the Gospel is at stake under all our attempts to undermine what Scripture says and Tradition does as well as playing fast and loose with the hopes of those who have not been well catechized into what the Church believes, teaches, and confesses and why.  So, be kind.  Be clear.  Say no when no is the only answer that can be said and still be faithful to the doctrine of the apostles, the sacred deposit bequeathed to the saints, the Word of the Lord, and the Tradition handed down to us.