There is a bunch of great Reformation Day material this year. So here's a list of some of it since people would get annoyed with me if I shared it all on Facebook. (Note: The blue headings are links that will take you to the full articles.)
Witches, wizards, skeletons, devils, and superheroes? Never mind that. Let’s get to the candy! As Halloween approaches, many calling themselves Christians will get all worked up about this supposedly satanic holiday. With emphases on witches and devils and violent horror, these folks get upset and say that Christians have no business observing this holiday and ought to do something better, something more godly and pious. Thus all over “Halloween” celebrations are replaced with “Fall Festivals.” There’s even a group who invented a new holiday on October 31 called “Jesus Ween.” (Does anyone else think that just sounds odd and creepy all at once?) So can you be a Christian and celebrate Halloween? Can you dress up and go to a party? Go trick-or-treating? Have fun? The fact is, a Christian CAN celebrate and enjoy Halloween. Read on to find out why.
Yes, His Word! Only His Word! And with His Word He gives Himself. Entirely. Completely. To be God for you! With all His Good Friday benefits. All His Easter gifts! All His pentecosting you with His Spirit! That’s what He gives to you with His Word.
Dead People Don't Accept Jesus
This week's HT-Video short by Pastor Borghardt answer a question on how to talk with your friends about why you don't and can't accept Jesus into your heart.
In the Name + of Jesus. Amen. Happy Reformation Day! Today we celebrate that, through Martin Luther 500 years ago, the Lord brought the light of the Gospel more brightly to His church. And if there is anything Dr. Luther and our Lutheran forefathers taught, it's that Christ's Word is the truth that sets us free.
Luther's Diet of Worms Speech from 2003 Luther Movie
I only spent one year away from home living at school. As a freshman living in the dorms at Concordia Wisconsin, being thrown into the freedom and responsibility of college was tough. Add to that being turned down by the girl I asked out, severely struggling with my Greek course, and many days sitting alone at dinner and you end up with a pretty depressing year.
Through that depressing year, daily chapel services and the three nights a week of evening prayer offices were a great blessing to me. When nothing seemed to be going my way, I could still take refuge in the Word of God and the hymns and prayers of the church. The chapels on campus very literally became my sanctuaries from the troubles of life. Most nights when I couldn’t sleep, I walked up to the Prayer and Meditation Chapel and would pray Compline. Sure, I could have prayed in my dorm room, but there is an added element of peace praying before the altar and crucifix. The church nave itself confesses Christ. It is extremely difficult to walk into a church and not be immediately reminded of your baptism and Christ’s death and resurrection for you even when nothing in life is going the way you want it to.
I walked passed the chapels multiple times a day, since I had to walk through chapel hallway to get to anything from my dorm room. At all hours, you could hear students practicing on the organs. It was a constant reminder that not only was the chapel our home away from our home congregations but that it is our home away from our heavenly home. The physical place where heaven comes down to meet earth. The place where Christ physically places His body and blood into our mouths.
I have now been living at home for the past several years as I finish up my schooling. Still, my church, Mount Zion Lutheran, remains a great blessing to me. Each Sunday morning I am able to go to my home away from my heavenly home. I walk in and hear the pre-service music being played by the organist. The icons depicting major points in the life of Christ are displayed on the wall. A crucifix hangs above the altar as an instant reminder of my baptism into Christ’s death. In this home away from home, I hear the words of Christ, words of Holy Absolution and the proclamation of Law and Gospel. I see the altar, the baptismal font, the crucifix, the art, and the architecture itself which constantly point to Jesus for me. I see the bread and wine as Pastor lifts it before me and says, “The peace of the Lord be with you always.” I taste the bread and wine the body and blood of Christ given for me as it is placed into my mouth. I go home my true home in the presence of Christ. I feast with my ancestors, my brothers and sisters - the whole church. I rejoice with the whole company of heaven. All in this place. This physical building set aside for one purpose. The place where Christ’s Word is preached and His gifts are given to His people.
Can the Word be preached and gifts be given in an auditorium, concert hall, houses or classrooms? Absolutely. But why settle for that when you can have a place set aside for just that purpose. A physical sanctuary from all the troubles of this life. A place that no matter what is happening outside its walls, confesses Christ for you.
Here stands the font before our eyes,
Telling how God has received us.
The altar recalls Christ's sacrifice
And what His Supper here gives us.
Here sound the Scriptures that proclame
Christ yesterday, today, the same,
And evermore, our Redeemer.
Grant, then, O God, Your will be done,
That, when the church bells are ringing,
Many in saving faith may come
Where Christ His message is bringing;
"I know My own; My own know Me.
You , not the world, My face shall see.
My peace I leave with you. Amen."
Yesterday, I read this article about John Paul II being beatified at a Vatican Mass. The original title was "John Paul II takes a step closer to sainthood." In response, I made the tongue-in-cheek tweet of: "Man... it's hard to be sainted in the Roman Catholic Church. I was just dragged kicking and screaming to the baptismal font."
People have all kinds of questions about God and what He is like, but they need only look to Jesus to find out. And they need only hear the preaching of the apostles proclaimed from the Scriptures in the church to see Him.
That preaching proclaims that God is all about saving sinners. There's no “keeping score” with God. He sends His Son in the flesh to be pierced for sinners. To bleed for sinners. To die for sinners. To rise for sinners. Everything Jesus does is for our salvation. And everything in the church, from the washing of Baptism, to the Supper of Christ's Body and Blood is Jesus showing us the Father and being God for us.
So, what's the difference? John Paul II being sainted by the RCC is all about him - what he did. Philip and James were sinners confessing Christ (sometimes they weren't very good at that either). Cries of "santo subito!" (sainthood now) have been heard since John Paul II's funeral. In the end you and I DO have sainthood now! We're baptized! Saint and sinner at the same time. The sinner part is pretty apparent to us and those around us the majority of the time. But we are also saint - not because of our bold confession or because we've done anything miraculous at all. Because we are baptized into the death and resurrection of Christ Jesus. We have been clothed with Christ! Nothing to do with us. But everything to do with Jesus for us!
We give thanks for the example of St. Philip and St. James and their preaching that God is all about saving sinners.
“And going into the house they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they fell down and worshiped him. Then, opening their treasures, they offered him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh.” Matt. 2:11
“When anyone brings a grain offering as an offering to the Lord, his offering shall be of fine flour. He shall pour oil on it and put frankincense on it and bring it to Aaron's sons the priests. And he shall take from it a handful of the fine flour and oil, with all of its frankincense, and the priest shall burn this as its memorial portion on the altar, a food offering with a pleasing aroma to the Lord.” Lev. 2:1-2
There has been a lot of talk about incense recently. Probably due to yesterday being the Feast of Our Lord’s Epiphany (one of the magi’s gifts being frankincense and all). Unfortunately, all the discussions I hear about incense seem to be missing something. They seem to be missing the gift!
There are a slew of people who can’t stand the smell of incense. Just the sight of a thurible can send them into a mad fit of coughing. Perhaps, that is because they associate all smoke with the smell of not-so-good smelling smoke. Perhaps they have better reasons. On the other side, there are people who use entirely too much incense for the space and ventilation of the area they are burning it in. That’s not very helpful and could send many more people into fits of coughing.
Let’s put all of that aside and assume that everyone can sit in a sanctuary where at least a very little incense was burned before a service or during the singing of Psalm 141. Now what? Why use incense?
Before I go on, you should know that I love incense. A couple years ago, I was talking with a friend and found out that an organist, who couldn’t stand incense, was the reason we didn’t have incense at one of the evening services we both attended. To which I responded, “I hate people!” (I haven’t been able to live that one down yet.) I knew that I liked incense but I wouldn’t have been able to give you a good answer as to why. I probably would have said the same things that many incense advocates say now. “Shouldn’t church smell like church?” “It visualizes our prayer before God” “It’s biblical. The Psalms say, ‘Let my prayer rise before You as incense.’” “People just don’t like it because they think it’s too Roman Catholic.” Not that any of those are completely terrible answers, I suppose. They just still don’t get to the gift of incense.
Then, a couple months ago I heard someone say, “If you ask someone why they like incense in worship and their answer has nothing to do with Jesus, they’re probably better of without it.” That’s what I was missing! Jesus! That has been sitting in the back of my mind since then. Sometimes, I even thought that I was better off without it. I just liked incense for incense sake. I thought that’s how the liturgy was REALLY suppose to be done! There’s no gift there. No gift at all.
Then comes Epiphany. (You could say that I had and epiphany on Epiphany). The magi bring Jesus gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. We always hear a lot about the gold and myrrh - how they are fitting gifts. I just don’t remember ever hearing much about the frankincense. (It is perfectly possible that I just wasn’t listening.) The gift of frankincense.
What was frankincense used for? It was used with sacrifices to make the aroma pleasing to the Lord! My Hebrew knowing, pastor, friends tell me that in the Old Testament when God was angry the text literally talks about His nose burning. The incense was meant to soothe the nose of God so that the Israelites might be in his favor once again.
Now, it probably isn’t so hard to see the gift of incense. The magi give frankincense to Jesus pointing us to why he was born in the first place. Born to be the ultimate sacrifice, the final sacrifice for them, and for you! So, now? Now, it serves as a reminder to us while pointing to Jesus. The gift of incense is that it reminds us that God is angry no more. Incense proclaims that there was a sacrifice who’s aroma was pleasing to God. Jesus, on the cross, taking upon Himself the sin of the world, for you! No longer will God’s nose burn against you. Jesus has taken up all the anger having it focused on Himself, so that you may have forgiveness and everlasting life!
That’s the gift of incense. Always pointing to Jesus, whether we like it or not.
Recently I watched a debate on YouTube titled "Does the Universe have a Purpose?" This debate, which was held in Puebla Mexico, pitted three prominent atheists against three prominent theists, and to accentuate the contentiousness of the topic each individual was invited in to the middle of a boxing ring to argue their positions, where they could land verbal punches against their opponents.
Over the last several years, in the wake of 9/11, debates between religion and science -- faith and reason -- have become very popular and very combative. But these kinds of debates are by no means a new phenomenon. CommonSenseAtheism.com lists 564 such debates dating back to 1948, although these debates date from well before then. 2,400 years ago Plato wrote, "Atheism is a disease of the soul before it becomes an error of understanding," and 300 years later the Roman philosopher Seneca the Younger proclaimed, "Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful."
And the debate continues unresolved. One need only look at a series of blogs here on the Huffington Post, along with the many strongly worded comments, to see that we are no closer to coming to a conclusion than were Plato and Seneca.
The two main topics of these debates are the nature of religion and the existence of God. It is crucial, though, that these two topics be examined separately. It is possible to constructively debate the merits or problems with religion. We can all concede that people have acted wickedly in the name of religion, that dogmatic, fundamentalist religion has caused much suffering, and that the refusal to accept the findings of science which are in conflict with one's doctrine is a foolish and small-minded position. To simply dismiss all religion, however, is not a rational or informed position, because we can also concede that religion has brought much good to the world, that most believers are not literalists, that religion itself is a very diverse and complex institution, and that insecurity, ideology and greed for power, not religion, have been the causes of most wars (and that to call Communism, Fascism, Nationalism and Nazism "religions" is to so distort the definition as to make it useless and unintelligible).
When the debate moves on to question of the existence of God, though, the dialogue hits a brick wall. The atheist side typically presents the position that belief in God is an immature science and that God is a provable or disprovable hypothesis for why things are the way they are, which, they argue, can be easily disproved: Evolution eliminates the need for a creator, double blind tests prove that prayer doesn't work, psychology has demonstrated that human beings often mistake random pattern for meaningful purpose, observation shows that we are an insignificant spot in the midst of a vast chaotic universe, and the death of a single innocent child makes the belief in a benevolent, omnipotent, omniscient God absurd, or even offensive.
The theist side then responds with arguments to rebut these points: The universe is too fine-tuned to be an accident, without a loving God there are no objective standards or source of values, and the very fact that we can comprehend the workings of physicality with our minds demonstrates the existence of a purposeful creator. Atheists then counter that there is absolutely no objective, quantifiable proof that God exists, that religion is ignorant of, uninterested in or dismissive of modern science, and that to believe in something without proof is inherently dangerous, especially when one thinks that he is acting on divine authority. The theist responds, and so on.
The debate about the existence of God hits a brick wall because there is an essential misunderstanding about the nature of God: None of the proofs that atheists are looking for, or any counter argument from the theists, would be adequate proof. In the Peubla debate, Michael Shermer said that he'd find convincing proof, "if you could have God grow new limbs on amputees from the Iraq war, Christian soldiers, praying for them to be healed. This has not happened even once. Apparently God can not do even what amphibians can do." But even if this did happen, it would not prove the existence of God but would instead prove that there is some kind of regenerative force or energy that responds to the right kind of conscious thought. Likewise, a glowing presence and booming voice appearing on the White House lawn proclaiming "I am the Lord your God, who took you out of the land of Egypt, the house of bondage" as the waters of the Potomac part, would prove that there is an entity with powerful technology, and would be no more a proof of God than an airplane to a cave man. And irrefutable proof that Moses really did write the first five books of the Bible, that Jesus died and was resurrected, or that an unearthly being appeared to Muhammad and Joseph Smith to dictate new texts, would support some of the claims of religions but does not prove that there is a purposeful, loving Creator and Sustainer.
The truth is that nothing -- no thing -- can prove the existence of God.
The attempt to prove the existence of God through the scientific method of hypothesis, controlled experimentation, observation and documentable repeatable results is somewhat akin to trying to discover the cause of a person's response to a deeply moving work of art. We can examine the painting, analyze the composition of the canvas and pigment, study the arrangement of shapes and colors, discover the historical context of the work and the biography of the artists, or even conduct psychological experiments and CT scans, but none of this will do anything to explain, understand and share in the person's aesthetic experience. This person may try to explain her experience, but she will ultimately fail to convince someone who only sees pigment on canvas, and who may conclude that her experience is delusional, and that the study of aesthetics is a waste of time. To the person who was so deeply impacted by the painting, though, such an assertion completely misses the point, and does nothing to convince her that her experience is not real, and that she was not touched and expanded by her encounter.
In this way, arguments and experiments can not prove the existence of God because God is not an hypothesis. For human beings, God is the experience of a transformative relationship with creation itself, in which we know that the Universe is inherently meaningful, that we were created for a staggering purpose that will unfold over eons, that love and gratitude are the essential actual materials of our lives and that we are holy beings.
The experience of a relationship with God is not one of religious doctrine, does not come from statistics, experiments or argument, and is certainly not in conflict with science and reason in any way. It is also not about righteous certainty or judgment. The experience of God expands the possibilities for our lives and increases the feeling of mystery and intellectual curiosity about the world. Reason and observation are crucial elements in faith. Faith and reason are not mutually exclusive and are no more in conflict than civil engineering and poetry.
As a rabbi and person of faith, I have no interest in proving the existence of God and certainly do not want to convert anyone to my religion or way of thinking. What I am passionate about, though, is helping bring others to an experience and relationship with God because I know that such a relationship can create powerful positive personal and communal transformation. One brings another to the experience of God not through philosophical or material proof, but through living the example of gratitude, purpose, compassion and love.
No doubt the debates about the existence of God will continue, and we can enjoy the spectacle, but I suspect that no amount of clever verbal exchange will do anything to convince anyone either way.
And here is my response:
Taking into account all the evidence pointing to Jesus' Death and Resurrection as historical fact: I tend to believe what he says. You rise from the dead I'll probably believe you too. :)
Can God be philosophically and undeniably proven? No.Neither almost anything else. But, I think Jesus is a pretty good source on this one.
The article falls apart because there is no Jesus - which is what separates Christianity from all other religions. I'm not really interested in proving the existence of some ambiguous God either. I am interested in making sure that you know Jesus Christ died and rose for you sins. From there everything else falls into place.
I only spent one year away from home living at school. As a freshman living in the dorms at Concordia Wisconsin, being thrown into the freedom and responsibility of college was tough. Add to that being turned down by the girl I asked out, severely struggling with my Greek course, and many days sitting alone at dinner and you end up with a pretty depressing year.
Yesterday, I read 
