The Christian is perfectly free, lord of all, subject to none; the Christian is perfectly bound, servant of all, subject to all. So said Luther in his writing On the Liberty of the Christian in 1521. Perfectly free before God through faith in Christ; perfectly bound before the neighbor through love.
That…
“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.” (Hebrews 13:8)
Some things never change. The way we think may change, our social conventions may change, our technologies change, the iPod may be changing as rumors have it (now we’ll have to buy new ones), even the way we see the world…
As Jesus was making His way to Jerusalem to give His life to save the world, someone came up to Him with a question. “Lord, are only a few people going to saved?”
You wonder sometimes, don’t you, when you look around at the world as it is. When you look at…
“I came to cast fire on the earth, and would that it were already kindled! I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how great is my distress until it is accomplished! Do you think that I have come to give peace on earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!”…
Our readings this morning take a little detour. Today, July 22nd is the feast day for St. Mary Magdalene. The rule is that the readings for the Sunday govern the divine service, and the feast day readings are used at the other services. But since this is the only service we have,…
Ask a law question, and you’ll get a law answer. The question (two of them actually) come from a synagogue “lawyer,” whose job it was to make the Bible reasonable and doable. His question is a law question. “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” It’s the most fundamental of all religious questions. What…
To hear one whom Jesus sends is to hear Jesus Himself. To reject one whom Jesus sends is to reject Jesus. And to reject Jesus is to reject the Father who sent Him. Those are the words the engage us in this morning’s Gospel. Good news (Gospel) to those who receive;…
Jesus set his face toward Jerusalem. Jerusalem was the place where He would be “taken up,” that is, be crucified bearing the sins of the world on this shoulders, and be raised to life on the third day, and be taken up to the right hand of the Father. All for you and…
Jesus comes to set the captives free, those held in darkness and chains, hostage to the demons and to death. He goes across the Sea of Galilee, after stilling a storm, and lands on the Gentile side, the country of the Gerasenes, opposite Galilee. A man from the city is there to meet…
He who is forgiven much, loves much. In today’s Gospel, he is a she - a “woman of the city,” a streetwalker, a prostitute who crashes a Pharisee’s dinner party with Jesus and receives so much more than she could dare to ask.
It was a gutsy move on her part. She…