(…continued…) Worship is communication. It is our ongoing conversation with God. Yes, we pray our own prayers at home, and yes we can read the Bible on our own, and should. But for thousands of years, this weekly hour of worship has been the primary place for this ongoing conversation. And when you […]
680) Worship (part three of four) Read More »
(…continued…) The Lutheran liturgy makes sure that when you come to church you will hear God’s Word. As a preacher, I take comfort in that. There are many weeks that I can’t come up with anything I am satisfied with for the sermon, but still, it is my job to
679) Worship (part two of four) Read More »
My wife and I were visiting with some old friends a while ago. We had a nice time talking, laughing, joking, and reminiscing. On the way home, Nancy said, “Karen told me that her and Bill have not spoken to each other for six weeks; not since they had a big fight after
678) Worship (part one of four) Read More »
(…continued) The Sacrament of Holy Communion is a ritual, one of the central rituals of the Christian faith. It was started by Jesus Himself to pass on the truth of who he was and what he was about to do. Jesus began this ritual the night before he was to
660) Just a Ritual? (part three of three) Read More »
(…continued) The solution to the problem of ‘dead ritual’ is to find ways to put meaning back into the ‘traditional rites.’ We need not advocate the continuation of a dead habit, but the solution must not be to have no ritual at all. Ritual is one of the important ways that we practice
659) Just a Ritual? (part two of three) Read More »
One of the big problems Jesus was always up against in his ministry was a religion that, in many ways, had lost its spirit. Many of the Jews at that time were very meticulous about the proper rituals and going through all the right motions on the outside, but on
658) Just a Ritual? (part one of three) Read More »
A sermon is supposed to explain and proclaim God’s whole Word, whether we like it or not. If you like everything the preacher says all the time, the preacher is probably not doing his or her job– and pastors need to be careful about that. They must resist the temptation to be only
613) Hear the Word of the Lord Read More »
A while back an old friend told me he didn’t go to church anymore. He said, “It’s the same old thing: ‘things are bad now,’ the preacher always says, ‘but someday Jesus will return and then everything will be better.’ I’ve heard it all before.” My friend knows I am
604) The Same Old Thing Read More »
By William Willimon, The Last Word, Abingdon Press, 2000, pages 78-80. Last year, on a bright summer Sunday, we worshiped with a little congregation in a fine old suburb of Berlin. The beautiful old church was only a few blocks from the Wannsee House where, just sixty years earlier, leaders of the Third
497) Getting Serious about God Read More »
From The Clergy of America: Anecdotes, pages 28-30, 1869, J. B. Lippincott Publishers, Philadelphia About a half century ago a Christian church was organized in a small town in Virginia. For some years it flourished, but after a while the pastor died, some of the members moved to different parts of the country,
451) The House of the Lord Read More »
