There’s an old Latin saying: Non multa sed multum (“not many things, but much”). It’s not so important that a pastor has read a thousand books, but that he’s deeply familiar with the greatest and best.
In the LCMS, following this tradition, we’ve sought to exercise freedom tempered by love.
The LCMS and its convention will not be exactly what any of us think they should be. But they will be what God gives us to be, together.
Christ empowers and invites us to live outside ourselves in praise to God and out of love for our neighbor.
Laypeople have a right and responsibility to speak the Gospel and Word of God, forgive sins, judge doctrine.
Martin Luther and our Lutheran Confessions recognize that there are two very significant aspects of the office of the pastor. One is from above, and the other is from below.
If you’ve been around as long as me, you’ll note we have enjoyed great, even dramatic improvement in the Synod’s life of doctrine and practice.
Tradition is a good thing, provided it does not contradict the Gospel and the Word of God, which is, after all, itself divine tradition.
The mission of the church is this: to proclaim the Gospel of free forgiveness of sin by the life, death and resurrection of Jesus.
By grace, through faith, only by Christ, we are reckoned somebody.
People often ask what heaven will be like. We know what it will be like. We’ll be like Jesus, body and soul. And we’ll enjoy a flesh-and-blood eternity.
According to Luther and our Lutheran confession, the Lord’s Supper is the Gospel: “Given and shed for you.”