The Silliness Knows No Bounds

And who better than our beloved Mollie to serve it up?

Mollie on Threats

Mollie on Money

Lord, have mercy. Lord, have mercy. Lord, have mercy.

A worthy prayer for Lent

We pray You, O Lord, to keep our tongues from evil and our lips from speaking deceit, that as Your holy angels continuously sing praises to You in heaven, so may we at all times glorify You on earth; through Jesus Christ, our Lord. (LSB p. 312)

Eating My Words

Okay, okay. So I spent some time this week with the Lutheran Study Bible material that CPH has available for perusal. I said I'm not the sort to get excited about study Bibles in general, but holy cow! The notes are DIFFERENT from so many study Bibles. I can't tell you the number of times I was reading pertinent commentary by my favorite St. John Chrysostom in the notes - not to mention goodies by Luther and others! The more I've looked at it (I spent some time in the Job selection), the more astonished I became. Sadly, Reformation Day is a LONG TIME away! I can't wait to get my hands on it. CPH, I don't know what's gotten into you, but from LSB to Concordia to Treasury to Lutheran Study Bible - WOW. I can only say: Thank God for your hard work and your faithfulness. If you've not explored the latest offering, you can check it out here:

Lutheran Study Bible

P.S. Hey, Lucciola, note the lovely MAUVE!

Visitors

One of the joys of living next to St. Paul's is when folks stop in to see the Church. Sitting right along old Route 66 and current Highway 55, St. Paul's has been a landmark for years. Today a retired Baptist minister and his wife stopped and asked to see inside. The bright afternoon sunshine pouring in through the opal stained glass windows filled the room with a warm, almost summery light. The two images of our Lord dominate the room, for the altar area is actually a little dark (its stained glass windows were blocked by a wall put up in the 1950's). The room, especially in the afternoon, bespeaks peace, calm, joy, prayer. I never pass through it this time of the day without stopping to soak in the atmosphere. A pity that so many of our members have never been in the room when the light is shining in like that. The Baptist minister and his wife commented on how beautiful the nave and the church were, and then they headed on down the road toward Springfield, Missouri. I'm glad God brought them to my door this afternoon, and that I got to spend some time enjoying the Church with them.

Old Lutheran Quote of the Day

As one cannot deny the fact that she [the Blessed Virgin] becomes pregnant through the Word, and no one knows how it comes about, so it is in the sacrament also. For as soon as Christ says: This is my Body, his body is present through the Word and the power of the Holy Spirit. - Blessed Martin Luther, AE 36:341 [1526]

Patristic Quote of the Day

We observe, then, that grace has more power than nature, and yet so far we have only spoken of the grace of a prophet's blessing. But if the blessing of man had such power as to change nature, what are we to say of that divine consecration where the very words of the Lord and Saviour operate? For that sacrament which you receive is made what it is by the word of Christ. But if the word of Elijah had such power as to bring down fire from heaven, shall not the word of Christ have power to change the nature of the elements? You read concerning the making of the whole world: He spoke and they were made, He commanded and they were created. Shall not the word of Christ, which was able to make out of nothing that which was not, be able to change things which already are into what they were not? For it is not less to give a new nature to things than to change them. -- St. Ambrose, *On the Mysteries* par. 52

The Intercessions

The original form of the intercessions in the liturgy were quite different from the normal pattern today. A deacon would call out the bid, and invite the people to kneel. Silence would be observed as each member of the royal priesthood would offer their intercessions privately. The subdeacon would then call the people to stand. The priest would "collect" the prayers of the people into a single prayer, which came to be called the collect, and they would all "Amen" this. The pattern would be repeated. Bid. Kneel. Private prayer. Stand. Common Prayer. Amen!

This pattern still survives in the liturgy for Good Friday with the so-called Bidding Prayer. Dix notes the sad consequence of its loss as a regular feature of the Divine Service:

"But all Christendom was then still at one on the way in which the public intercession should be offered - by a corporate act involving the whole church, in which nevertheless each order - laity, deacon and officiant (bishop or presbyter) - must actively discharge its own separate and distinct function within the fulfilment of the 'priestly' activity of the whole Body of Christ. It offers to God not only itself in its organic unity, but all the world with its sorrows and its busy God-given natural life and its needs. There is here a very revealing contrast with our own practice in this matter of liturgical intercession - the long monologue by the celebrant in the 'Prayer for the Church Militant' and the rapid fire of collects at the end of Morning and Evening Prayer. With us the deacon's part has completely disappeared, and the people's prayer and biddings - originally only led and directed - has been reduced to a single word, 'Amen.' If the truth be told, many of the more devout of our laity have come to suppose that intercession is a function of prayer better discharged in private than by liturgical prayer of any kind, so unsatisfying is the share which our practice allows them. The notion of the priestly prayer of the whole church, as the prayer of Christ the world's Mediator through His Body, being 'that which makes the world stand,' in the phrase of an early Christian writer, has been banished from the understanding of our laity." (Shape, p. 45)

LSB did not print the Bidding Prayer in the hymnal, but it is included in the Altar Book (page 406-409). The rubrics before it note:

The Bidding Prayer may replace the Prayers in the Daily Office or the Prayer of the Church in the Divine Service.

The assistant's bid invites the congregation to silent prayer, and the presiding minister is advised to pause briefly before collecting the thoughts of the congregation in each collect.

Our order does not include anymore the instructions to kneel and to stand. But the "brief pause" is actually essential for the prayer to return to the fullness of its ancient form: the people's intercession. Thus "brief" here must mean more than simply a few seconds. It means long enough for the people to intentionally frame and offer their intercession for the thing just bidden.

We have grown weak in prayer. We must own up to it. But here in the liturgy is hidden a prayer that itself unlocks the key to the unity of corporate and individual prayer and binds them together as one. What joy it would be to recover its fullness among us, that of us too it might be said: Ecclesia orans!

Questions

This especially for members of St. Paul or the Southern Illinois District. President Kieschnick has offered to answer questions that are written down and turned in at our District Convention. If you have a question you'd like to ask our Synodical President, you can post it in the replies and either I or our lay delegate, Kevin Reiseck will see that it gets turned in.

Old Lutheran Quote of the Day

The Scriptures, although they too are written by men, are neither of men nor from men but from God. -- Blessed Martin Luther, *Avoiding the Doctrines of Men* AE 35:153

Patristic Quote of the Day

It is not therefore possible to serve Him acceptably without a sense of gratitude to Him for all things, both for our trials, and the alleviations of them. -- St. John Chrysostom, Homily 33 on Hebrews

Lent Fast Approaching

Fast in BOTH meanings! Now it's only a week and half away. One of the sad things about the arrival of Lent is the abandonment of Job in his sufferings - as Pr. Leistico pointed out, for those of us reading with the Treasury and LSB Daily Lectionary, we only get the rest of the Job story in those years when Easter falls quite late. He suggests that folks might wish to continue reading the Job portions along with the assigned readings for Lenten tide. Not a bad idea. In any case, though, remember that the SKIP is about to happen, and on February 25 we will switch from the calendar year (just looking up the day's date) in Treasury to the Lenten portion (using the Church Year designations), beginning on page 24. In case you are wondering, from Ash Wednesday to the arrival of Easter Day is 157 pages worth of reading, and some quite choice selections, I might add. Unique to the Lenten portion of Treasury is daily Lenten Catechesis.

Pastor Gleason's Homily upon Sexagesima

Sermon for Sexigesima Sunday
Luke 8:4-15
Rev. William L. Gleason

The parable of the Sower and the Seed shows us the value of having God’s Word rooted within us. Jesus teaches us how grace comes to us through His Word like seed sown in the harvest field of the world. Our Lord scatters the seed of His Word by his Holy Spirit who, moving like a wind, carries the seed to receptive hearts.

But the parable also illustrates hindrances to that Word. We find that people can reject the Word of God. Instead of listening to it, as one would expect, we mock it, pervert it, or simply ignore it. The devil, too, is busy tampering with God’s Word, plucking it from the hearts of those who hear it. On top of that there are anti-Christian forces in the world and the evil intents of our flesh that are constantly fighting against God’s Word. This is all found in the parable of the Sower, illustrating how the Gospel fares in the world.

Jesus begins by teaching about three barriers to the Gospel. These are the spiritual forces against which we Christians struggle. They include attacks from the devil, persecution, and worldly temptations. We might say that every spiritual battle we face comes from one of these three enemies. But note the goal of each. They are not out to get the heart directly; rather, they are out to get the Word that has been sown in the heart! The common characteristic of each of these forces is to steal the Gospel away from us and keep our devotion focused on something other than God. Jesus warns us to watch for these hindrances to the Word because they are forces that would rob your heart of the Gospel. And when the Gospel is gone from your heart, then the light and life of God is gone from your soul.

What I want to look more closely at today, however, is the success of His Word that Jesus pictures for us here. He says the one who hears the word and receives it is like one in whom the seed takes root and bears fruit. It is how we get from the root to the fruit that I want us to focus on.

The first thing to learn from this parable is that we do not get rooted in the Word; rather the Word gets rooted in us. From that it follows that that we do not bear the fruit, but rather that the Word of God bears fruit in and through us. That’s an important point to bear in mind lest we kid ourselves into thinking that we can live holy lives by our own strength and efforts. On the contrary, we must rely solely on Christ and His strength. That’s what St. Paul meant when he wrote in Galatians 2:20, “...it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and delivered Himself up for me.” So the Word of God must be rooted in us to bear fruit in us!

Now for the Word to be rooted in us, it must be sown in our hearts by God; and He does this through very ordinary means. First, He sows the Word by the preaching of the Gospel. Then, through the Word sown, He plants His Church by gathering believers around the Word. Finally through the Church planted He bears fruit in the world by calling and gathering more believers into His Church. This is the progression—the propagation, if you will—of God’s Word; and nothing can stop this movement of God because His power is behind it. Thus by the movement of the Spirit, the Word of God is sown through the world. It is scattered into the hearts of people by the preaching of the Gospel, so that by hearing they may believe. The Spirit breaks through the barriers of the world and the attacks of Satan. He bears fruit when souls are saved and troubled hearts are given assurance of eternal life and hope in the kingdom of God.

That fruitfulness of the Word is illustrated in the last part of Jesus’ parable when He speaks of the seed bearing fruit a hundred-fold. This fruitfulness is also the work of the Holy Spirit. When the Spirit plants in our hearts the Gospel of our blessed Savior, who suffered and died for our sins and rose from the grave to give us life, He causes that Word to sprout forth with faith. By God’s gracious love and working we believe that message of grace. From that point on, our faith must be cultivated continually—cultivated by devoting ourselves to the Word through daily scripture study and prayer, through Sunday school and worship, through every opportunity to “serve and obey, pray, praise, and give thanks” to our Lord. Again St. Paul said, “Let the Word of Christ dwell richly within you.” That’s sound advice because Christ’s Word is the seed of our faith. Without his Word there is no root; and without devotion to that Word we have no defense against the evil forces of the world and no shield against the attacks of Satan. It is spiritually vital for us to cultivate that divine Word within us.

Another aspect of the fruitfulness of the Word is the work of the Spirit spreading the Gospel throughout the world— beginning in our own homes, church, and community. What an amazing process of growth we see in the movement of the Holy Spirit! He carries the Word into the hearts of people “when and where He pleases;” and He creates faith in those hearts. Then, when He has gathered His people together, He establishes the Ministry among them. He gathers His people together so that through this Ministry they may sow his Word and his grace to another place and another people. Then they in turn go with Him through the same Ministry of proclaiming the gospel, sharing the sacraments, and caring for one another. That is the fruit of the Spirit moving through the church into the world.

The final fruit of the Word will be seen when God’s sons and daughters are revealed at Christ’s return. Until that day, the church will continue to grow with the Word in the power of the Holy Spirit. The fruit of our spiritual growth stems from the Gospel rooted in our hearts. The Gospel is cultivated by our devotion to that Word producing the spiritual fruits of repentance, faith, and works of love. Martin Franzman puts this hope in poetic form in his hymn, “Preach You the Word,” which concludes with God’s promise to be with and bless His Word wherever it is sown:

Preach you the Word and plant it home

And never faint; the Harvest Lord

Who gave the sower seed to sow

Will watch and tend His planted Word.
Amen.

Wisdom! St. Augustine on Scripture and the Right of Judgment

5. As regards our writings, which are not a rule of faith or practice, but only a help to edification, we may suppose that they contain some things falling short of the truth in obscure and recondite matters, and that these mistakes may or may not be corrected in subsequent treatises. For we are of those of whom the apostle says: "And if you be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you." Philippians 3:15 Such writings are read with the right of judgment, and without any obligation to believe. In order to leave room for such profitable discussions of difficult questions, there is a distinct boundary line separating all productions subsequent to apostolic times from the authoritative canonical books of the Old and New Testaments. The authority of these books has come down to us from the apostles through the successions of bishops and the extension of the Church, and, from a position of lofty supremacy, claims the submission of every faithful and pious mind. If we are perplexed by an apparent contradiction in Scripture, it is not allowable to say, The author of this book is mistaken; but either the manuscript is faulty, or the translation is wrong, or you have not understood. In the innumerable books that have been written latterly we may sometimes find the same truth as in Scripture, but there is not the same authority. Scripture has a sacredness peculiar to itself. In other books the reader may form his own opinion, and perhaps, from not understanding the writer, may differ from him, and may pronounce in favor of what pleases him, or against what he dislikes. In such cases, a man is at liberty to withhold his belief, unless there is some clear demonstration or some canonical authority to show that the doctrine or statement either must or may be true. But in consequence of the distinctive peculiarity of the sacred writings, we are bound to receive as true whatever the canon shows to have been said by even one prophet, or apostle, or evangelist. Otherwise, not a single page will be left for the guidance of human fallibility, if contempt for the wholesome authority of the canonical books either puts an end to that authority altogether, or involves it in hopeless confusion. -- St. Augustine, Contra Faustum, XI

Fitting Reading before Lent

I heartily commend Dr. Luther's *Avoiding the Doctrines of Men* in AE 35 as fitting reading prior to the Lenten fast. A salutary antidote to those who would make too much traditions of men regarding distinction of foods and such. Yet he makes it clear: "I here give notice to the insolent, undisciplined, whose only evidence of being Christian is that they can eat eggs, meat, and milk, stay away from confession, break images, and so forth, that it is not my purpose here to have served them." So while exhorting to Christian discipline and yet refusing bondage over these matters, Luther walks a golden mean that we'd do well to learn from. It's not a very long writing, but totally worthwhile.

Patristic Quote of the Day

The body which is born of the holy Virgin is in truth body united with divinity, not that the body which was received up into the heavens descends, but that the bread itself and the wine are changed into God's body and blood . But if you enquire how this happens, it is enough for you to learn that it was through the Holy Spirit, just as the Lord took on Himself flesh that subsisted in Him and was born of the holy Mother of God through the Spirit. And we know nothing further save that the Word of God is true and energises and is omnipotent, but the manner of this cannot be searched out. -- St. John of Damascus, *On the Orthodox Faith* IV:16

Old Lutheran Quote of the Day

Note well, that the power of Scripture is this: it will not be altered by the one who studies it; instead, it transforms the one who loves it. It draws the individual in--into itself--and into its own powers. WA (Weimar Ausgabe) 3:397,9-11, Blessed Martin Luther

Let Solemn Awe Possess Us

O let the people praise Thy worth,
In all good works increasing;
The land shall plenteous fruit bring forth,
Thy Word is rich in blessing.
May God the Father, God the Son
And God the Spirit bless us!
Let all the world praise Him alone,
Let solemn awe possess us.
Now let our hearts say, "Amen!"
--LSB 824, st. 3
Hymn of the Day for Sexagesima

I don't know

if I've ever mentioned what a SPLENDID game LIverpool is? It takes just the right skill to come out the winner, I'd say. Great game, indeed. Better luck next time, Jo... ;)

Old Lutheran Quote of the Day

We need to be on guard against the weaknesses and infirmities of our nature, against succumbing to false security, but petitioning God for His Holy Spirit, to remove such obstacles, to sweep out those thorns and thistles from our hearts, so that we can continue to hear and retain God's Word, and bring forth the good fruit, by faith in Christ, through which faith we not only live in obedience to God but also become God's children and heirs. The main reason this seed is sown, that is the gospel is proclaimed in all the world, is to create and work fruit in us which endures into eternity. -- Blessed Martin Luther, Homily for Sexagesima (HP I:290)

Patristic Quote of the Day

"Is it not strange that those who sit in the marketplace tell the names, and races, and  cities and talents of charioteers and dancers, even accurately state the good and bad qualities of horses, while those who assemble in this place [the church] understand nothing of what is taking place here and even are ignorant of the number of the [sacred] Books?" (Hom. 32 On John) - St. John Chrysostom