A Famine Not of Bread

Click here to listen to this sermon. “The whole commandment that I command you today you shall be careful to do, that you may live and multiply, and go in and possess the land that the Lord swore to give to your fathers. And you shall remember the whole way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that He might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not. And He humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that He might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord” (Deuteronomy 8:1-3). Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ! Thanksgiving is a time for reflection and remembrance. A time for reflecting upon the bounteous blessings God has so freely bestowed upon us out of His lavish love and abundant mercy. A time for remembering the...

Click here to listen to this sermon. “So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed Him, ‘If you abide in My Word, you are truly My disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free’” (John 8:31–32). Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ! As we observe Reformation Day, we remember how the Lutheran tradition was born from a deep commitment to God’s Word. This commitment, rooted in the courage of Martin Luther and generations of believers, continues to shape our faith and life today. After being excommunicated for heresy and threatened with death in 1521, Martin Luther appeared at the Diet of Worms, and refused to recant of his writings, stating, “I do not accept the authority of popes and councils, for they have contradicted each other—my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and I will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. Here I stand. God help me. Amen.” [i] Fifty years later...

Click here to listen to this sermon. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Appearance. Style. Image. They’re everything in our world. In debates. At work. In school. Even in the church. Among Christians. Are you healthy, wealthy, and successful? Is your church growing rapidly? Well then, God must love you. That’s the popular thinking. But appearances can be deceiving. Take Lazarus, for example. A beggar. His body is riddled with oozing sores. Dogs lick the pus, and he’s too weak, too depressed, to stop them. He’s an outcast who rummages through the dumpster, looking for the scraps that have fallen from the table of the rich and elite. Does Lazarus look like he’s blessed? No, he looks like he’s a man to be pitied. He appears to not be blessed by God. In fact, maybe God doesn’t even like Lazarus too much. Otherwise, he’d be healthy, wealthy, and prosperous. That’s what the world would say in a culture where image is everything. Then there’s the ric...

Click here to listen to this sermon. “So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed Him, ‘If you abide in My Word, you are truly My disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free’” (John 8:31–32). Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ! From the beginning of the Reformation, Lutherans have taken God’s Word seriously. After being excommunicated for heresy and threatened with death in 1521, Martin Luther appeared at the Diet of Worms, and refused to recant of his writings, stating, “I do not accept the authority of popes and councils, for they have contradicted each other—my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and I will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. Here I stand. God help me. Amen.” [i] Fifty years later, a new generation of Lutheran pastors declared to the world: “By God’s grace, with intrepid hearts, we are willing to appear before the judgment seat of Christ with this Con...