Dr. Davis just nails it:

Elimination of wheat is the single most powerful strategy for health available to Americans, more powerful than any supplement, drug, or procedure to restore health, eliminate abnormal triggering of appetite and other abnormal mind and emotional effects, lose weight, and obtain relief from a long list of abnormal health conditions.

Read more here.

I feel for the wheat farmers.  There is no way that this info is going to be kept back from the public - it keeps spreading and folks keep experimenting and making the same shocking discovery over and over again. With tossing the grains out the window, a host of issues leave too and weight drops. Even O'Reilly's got it figured out!

New Lutheran Quote of the Day

Since hymnody is meant to be ecumenical and transcultural, it should be inspired by the Psalms and, ideally, include the best compositions from all ages and cultures.  It should not represent the work of only one tradition or of the present generation. -- Dr. John Kleinig, Singing with Grace in our Hearts, Teach Me Thy Way, O Lord, p. 112.

Old Lutheran Quote of the Day

By our sins we had merited the fires of hell, but God looked upon us in His boundless mercy.  This is the reason He sent His Son, and for the sake of His Son He now remits our sins. -- Blessed Martin Luther, House Postil III:320 (Upon the Nativity of the Baptist)

Patristic Quote of the Day

Christ wills to suffer in His servants. -- St. Ambrose, Sermon against Auxentius, 14

Missionary Orientation DONE

Well, at least MY part in teaching is.  Now it's just providing the morning, chapel, and evening prayer services for next week. 

Less than an hour

after the decision was issued from the Supreme Court of the United States, we gathered in chapel for worship at the International Center.  Dr. Oschwald gave us great joy out of Acts 16.  And in our prayers we remembered those afflicted by the wildfires, our new missionaries, and also prayed for our country:

Holy Father, You know how divided we have been as a nation on the question of health care as on many other public policy issues. Forgive us where we have failed to explain our neighbors’ actions in the kindest ways, when we let tempers flare and sully each others’ reputations. You have commanded us to pray for all our public servants and so we come to You now putting them all in Your omnipotent hands. We thank you for each branch of our state and federal governments. Grant them Your guidance in these difficult days. Help them to pursue policies that protect the rights of all the citizens of this nation to practice their faith without coercion or interference, and yet give them Your wisdom that together we might find ways to meet the deep needs and persistent challenges before us. Help us as a people to turn to You, to learn from You, to value what You value and to prize what You prize. Without Your blessing, we will surely bring it all to ruin; with Your blessing, we will not fail. We ask all these things in the name of Him who gave His very life in love for us and for all, even Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.

A Most Crazy Week

what with both Conferences, but the Deaconesses have departed to their blessed callings, and I have only one more day of teaching at Missionary Orientation.  It's so wonderful to get to know these folks a little bit - the ones who will be scattered across the globe.  May the Lord Jesus and the Holy Spirit bear rich fruit through them so that the Church may grow and many, many more be gathered into the Father's family.  If you are in the area, join us for the Sending Service - a Divine Service celebrated in the International Center Chapel on July 6 at 2 p.m.  Dr. Herb Mueller, Synod First Vice President, will preach; Pr. Kevin Golden will preside at the Eucharist and I will assist.

Shortly off to Pallotine Retreat Center

where the Concordia Deaconess Conference (or at least a large part of the same) will gather to begin their conference.  I REALLY wish I could be at the entire conference - not only to visit with the Deacs but because two of my all-time favorite teachers will be presenting:  Prs. Bruce Keseman and Randy Asburry.  The topic this year?  Unpacking the parables of Jesus.  I hope to at least get to listen in on some. 

The fly in the ointment, as it were, is that running concurrently with the Deaconess Conference is the Missionary Orientation at the International Center.  The theme for this year's Orientation?  Credo:  Created...to live forever!  The theme verse is from 1 John 5:  God has given us eternal life and this life is in His Son.  Part of the first week will involve five catechetical sessions on the Creed, and particularly attending to the Large Catechism's handy unpacking of the same.  Looking forward to that too.  And each day of the two week experience will wrap up with singing Evening Prayer.  I'll have to miss the first one of those because of celebrating the Divine Service at the Deaconess Conference. 

It promises to be a crazy, joy-filled, delightful week or two!

New Lutheran Quote of the Day

The Lord entrusted His life-giving Word to the community and still leads it today through the Word.  The Holy Spirit adds to this community all who are baptized into Christ, trusting in the dead and resurrection of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins, which is the center message of Scripture. -- Edward Engelbrecht, The Lutheran Study Bible

Old Lutheran Quote of the Day

How does one come to faith?  I will tell you.  Our Lord Jesus said, "Peace be with you.  Behold, My hands, etc."  [In other words, he is saying] Look, man, I am the only one who has taken away your sins and redeemed you, etc.; now be at peace.  -- Blessed Martin Luther, cited in Today's Treasury reading (June 24). 

Patristic Quote of the Day

It is significant that John's birth is recorded as having taken place when the days began to grow shorter, while the Lord was born as they grew longer. It was John himself who explained the meaning of this contrast when the crowd thought he was the Christ because of his great virtues, and the Lord was considered by some as only a prophet and not the Christ because of his lack of austerity. "He must increase," said John, "while I must decrease." -- The Venerable Bede

Some Augustana Thoughts

as the day we commemorate its Presentation to Emperor Charles V approaches (Monday):

The Augustana in its doctrinal articles begins with the Triune God and ends with the saints (and the saints are put in the doctrinal articles, not the abuse articles! HT Fr. Heath Curtis).

 The order is significant in the first 13 articles of the first portion:  from the Blessed Trinity we recognize the fallen state of man (diseased and corrupted) to the remedy for our malady:  the Savior.  The Savior's great gift to us:  justification.  How He arranged that gift to be imparted (the Ministry).  What that gift produces by His Spirit within us:  good works.  The arena in which all this happens:  the Church (which is the One assembly of all saints).  How we are brought into Christ (Baptism), kept in Christ (Eucharist / Absolution) and so preserved in lives of repentance.

For Article XIV see here.

Article XV is huge in our day for its neglect.  Folks run right away to FC X.  But that's the wrap up, not the starting place.  The start is AC XV and it needs much more pondering among us.

I find it striking that AC IV was among the articles about which they apparently didn't think there'd be a disagreement.  They list those from XXII to XXVIII.  I think that is because the position of AC IV had always been a bit of an Augustianian option.  Does that account also for the fact that the contrary view is "rejected" but that the strong "condemn" word is not used here?

Schroeder I think it was who argued that the big fight in AC all along was the one they saved for last:  XXVIII.  The question of the authority of bishops.  I think there's some truth to that.  The authority question continues to plague us, complicated by the old Adam's drive to always "play the boss" and so utterly contrary to the Savior's notion of authority.  I think the AC runs well with the new rather than the old Adam.

The entire genius of the confession is its (to borrow Lewis' phrase) presentation of "mere Christianity."

A read of the entire can give a resounding call to repentance to our contemporary living out of the faith in the Church.  Here's a hint:  drop the silly mission statements and let every single parish adopt this one.  Our mission is to be the Church of God in this place and at this time.  That's it.  A baptizing, Gospel-preaching and teaching, Eucharist centered, sinner-absolving and repentance living community, drenched in prayer (the Church's prayers and hymns by which we echo the Word).  Or, said another way, to manifest in each locale the ONE assembly of all saints - even though due to our sin, our fallenness and weak hold on grace, it will be always but a partial and fragmentary manifestation.  Still, it will point to the coming Kingdom and even more, offer to the weary, rebellious and fallen world the opportunity to taste and see the goodness of the Lord.

The AC is needed today, more than ever, and not as something that Lutherans wave at other Christians to condemn them, but as something that Lutherans use as a mirror.  To remember what we once were, to see where we have fallen, to see what by God's grace we might yet become again. 

A cleaned up pic -

 - thanks to Mark Huntemann.  Now you can clearly see the Alpha at the top (there's an Omega at bottom), the IHC (Jesus) to one side and the Chi-Rho (Christ) on the other. 

Behold, the Lamb of God!

So when I got back to work this week, I was absolutely delighted to see that the amazing Barb Knehans had indeed seen to the placement of the crucifix in the Chapel.  It had been planned for a while, but I asked her if there were any way it could be in place before the Missionary Orientation, and voila!  Thanks, Barb.  There is something so utterly powerful about having the great "for you" before our eyes - the Lamb of God, victorious in His sacrifice of love.  Behold, O Christian, your righteousness, your life, your very salvation. 

In old Lutheran art, much hay was made of the way that the crucifix stands above the altar from which the self-same body and blood are put into the mouths of His people. and to which all true preaching points and proclaims.  That will happen on Friday, July 6, when we celebrate the sending service for the new missionaries being oriented this week and next. 

Pastor Golden of Village Lutheran Church (which sponsors the Eucharist) will preside, Vice-President Mueller will proclaim the Gospel, and I will be assisting minister.  Christopher Ahlman (also one of the missionaries!) will be serving on the organ bench.  Lots of other special music too.  All to proclaim and rejoice in the presence of Him whose body and blood upon the cross atoned the sins of the world and who gives now that body and blood into us that we might share in His unending life - that life of being sent as sacrifices out into the world to give away to others the love and life that we have received in Him!

A Review of David and Meaghan's Wedding Homily

by Pr. Todd Wilken on Issues Etc yesterday.  Listen in here.

New Lutheran Quote of the Day

From the Lord,
through the prophets and apostles,
in the community of faith that confesses God's Word,
we receive the Gospel-promise of our salvation in Christ and
return to the Lord our heartfelt service, prayers, and praise.

--Edward Engelbrecht, General Editor of the Lutheran Study Bible, p. xxx in the same.

Old Lutheran Quote of the Day

Moreover, the promises of the Law require perfect obedience as is said in the first commandment:  "I will do good to those who love me" [cf. Deut. 5:10].  But the evangelical promise - about remission of sins, justification, and the gift of eternal life - is gratuitous, offered on account of Christ, without a condition of our merits or our worthiness.  -- Philip Melanchthon, Romans,  p. 22.

Patristic Quote of the Day

Thus each of these heresies [he has just spoken of Marcionism and Arianism], in respect of the peculiar impiety of its invention, has nothing in common with the Scriptures. And their advocates are aware of this, that the Scriptures are very much, or rather altogether, opposed to the doctrines of every one of them; but for the sake of deceiving the more simple sort (such as are those of whom it is written in the Proverbs, 'The simple believes every word Proverbs 14:15),' they pretend like their 'father the devil John 8:44 ' to study and to quote the language of Scripture, in order that they may appear by their words to have a right belief, and so may persuade their wretched followers to believe what is contrary to the Scriptures.-- St. Athanasius, To the Bishops of Libya and Egypt, Chapter 4.

There IS one thing you don't want to...

...bring from Mexico with you.  Only I did.  Whoops.  It was still totally worth it.

An Open Letter on Religious Freedom

Can be downloaded as a bulletin insert here.  This letter was authored by President Harrison but 24 religious leaders from Lutheran, Orthodox, Roman, Evangelical and other groups joined in signing it with him.