Cross Talk: Choices

Life is a series of choices. Some of them, you make. Most are made for you. Starting with your conception, God chose for you which one of myriad eggs would be released and which of millions of gametes would fertilize that egg to make a zygote. That choice determined your DNA for life.

But God’s choice of your DNA was only the beginning. Choices that your mother made while you were growing in her womb, choices that your father made and choices that community and national leaders made without your input, all determined uncounted aspects of your life. All of this happened without your choice or approval.

Embryologists have yet to learn when you made your first choice. When did you first do something that was not determined from outside of you—and what was it? Was it a thought? Was it the voluntary movement of an arm? Was it at two weeks’ gestation, or eight weeks? Whatever and whenever it was, it was a choice within strict limitations. Choice to clench your fist—is only possible if you have a fist to clench. A choice to swing it at something is limited by the reach of your arm.

That is the thing about choice. It is always the result of God’s prior choice. Because we are His creatures, no one of our choices is fully free. Some of the limits placed on your choice are direct limits from God. Others come through other people.

God alone determines how tall you are and how high you can jump. By physical training, you can strengthen your body to get closer to that God-imposed limit, but you can never exceed it. But there are other limits that God imposes by way of command. God’s “thou shalt not” requires your agreement. Unlike the law of gravity, you are not forced to obey. But those who don’t obey bring all sorts of trouble and misery into their lives.

The judgment of God lies at the intersection of these two sorts of choices. He first makes choices for you that equip you to do things. Then, He tells you how you ought to use these things. For instance, he gives you legs to walk, arms to carry, eyes to see your brother in need, and more food than you need for yourself. Only after giving you all these gifts does he say, “go feed your hungry brother.”

You can either obey his command because He enabled you, or you can defy Him. The choice is yours. But one choice is right and the other is wrong. God is the judge. God is the judge because He gave you the choice in the first place. He is not an intruder into your choices, He is the giver of choices.

God gave us our lives, our bodies, our choices and then taught us how to use all these great gifts. Not only do you have no reason to resent His loving guidance to those who keep His commandments, you learn by experience that God’s will is always better than your own ideas. His ways are sheer delight, wholly human, and fully satisfying.

Best of all, God became a man just like you. He, and He alone, made all the right choices. He lived the perfect life of love. He could do anything He wanted—with unlimited power and sovereignty. But He chose to use His human body—the body of the Word made flesh—to live for you and to die for you.

That’s why it is such a comfort to know that, on the Day of Judgment, God will sit on the judgment seat in the body of Jesus. Your judge will be one who lived the human life. Your judge will also be the One who died that you might live.

Believe in Him and you will have no need to be afraid in the Day of Judgment. Believe in Him and your life, already now, will begin to look like His life. And that’s a beautiful choice.

Cross Talk: Christians honor authorities

In recent months, Romans 13 has received a great deal of attention. While this chapter is too great to cover completely, let’s walk through a few of its most important teachings.  

Paul begins, “Let every soul be subject unto the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God. Therefore whosoever resists the authority, resists the ordinance of God. and those who resist will bring judgment on themselves.” (Romans 13:1-2).

We should notice, first, that Paul puts submission to authority as the first priority. It is the foundation stone of a godly life. God himself has created human beings to live in hierarchies. To be godly people requires recognition that God puts us in relationships of authority and humility. To live in insubordination brings harm (judgment) to ourselves.

Second, know that authorities are not only presidents and governors. God-ordained relationships also include parents and children, husbands and wives, teachers and students, police and citizens. Authority is not oppression, and subordination is not being oppressed. On the contrary, humbling ourselves before authority that has been ordained by God is empowering. And authorities that recognize the source of their power are necessarily humble.

Third, St. Paul reminds us that God gives authority for our good. “For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to evil. Do you want to be unafraid of authority? Do what is good, and you will have praise from the same. For he is God’s minister to you for good. But if you do evil, be afraid; for he does not bear the sword in vain; for he is God’s minister, an avenger to execute wrath on him who practices evil” (Romans 13:3-4).

Government is not merely a “necessary evil.” It is a divine and blessed gift. That’s why Christians thank God for presidents, governors, husbands, parents, teachers and police. We don’t only thank God when they do what we want. We thank him for their very existence.

Fourth, we also recognize that they have a God-given responsibility. When they execute their office according to God’s command, it not only benefits us, it benefits them. Christians pray, “May all that receive the sword as Thy ministers bear it according to Thy commandment.” We do this not only for our own sake, but also for their benefit. We ask God’s blessing upon them as persons.

Fifth, authorities are persons. We must never lose sight of that. The great evil of vitriolic “identity politics” is that people seek to dehumanize political opponents. Those who get caught up in this evil, never succeed in dehumanizing their targets. They do, however, dehumanize themselves. Christians must fight against this evil by praying constantly for all those in authority.

Sixth, the current political ugliness has another consequence as well. Those under our own authority learn from our attitudes toward others. That is why we see—across the board—a widespread disrespect for authority. Students are rude and disobedient toward teachers. Children disrespect parents. This will not be reversed unless we learn to treat state and national authorities with honor and dignity.

“Therefore you must be subject, not only because of wrath, but also for conscience’ sake” (Rom. 13:5). The unbelieving world grudgingly submits to authority only as much as necessary to escape punishment. Christians have a completely different attitude. We consider authorities as gifts from God. We help and support them with kindly advice, patience, deference, and fervent prayer.

We know that they are crowned by Jesus Christ, the One who Himself was crowned with thorns and rules over all the kingdoms of this world.

CrossTalk: Fear, Love and Trust in God above all things

COVID-19 has been the occasion of a great deal of evil. Not only have we lost precious people to the illness, there have been other harms as well. Economies have been devastated. Businesses have been bankrupted. People have been set against one another. Families and friendships have been broken. Worship has been impeded, and sometimes forbidden.

But above all of these, the most heartbreaking effect of COVID-19 is the fear that it stirs up. In our age of scientism, we have been conditioned to think that every problem can be solved, and every danger averted by the proper application of science.

But five months into the pandemic, we still have no sure-fire cure for the disease. Some think hydroxychloroquine helps. But others don’t. Purell, disinfectant sprays, social distancing, quarantines, thermometers and masks in a dozen varieties are all said to help. But not one of these things can guarantee 100-percent protection.

Despite all these precautions, people still get sick and some die from this invisible and undetectable threat. Our inability to predict and control the disease gives rise to fear, frustration and anger.

But scientism is a false religion. It cannot control everything. It cannot solve every problem. There is only One who is capable of controlling the universe and curing diseases. The Lord God almighty is the maker of heaven and earth. The One who created the universe and everything in it also created the COVID-19 strain and He still controls it.

We still don’t know whether God created it by an evil scientist or by an accident of nature. But we do know that it is from God. We don’t know whether we might get it from our pet cat or from a stranger at the gas station. But we do know that nothing will happen apart from God’s willing it.

If a friend or a loved one contracts the virus, we don’t know whether it will act like the common cold, or lead to multiple organ failures and death. But God knows. More than that, He remains in control. God is not a mere observer with foreknowledge of events. He remains the creative cause of all things at all times.

When we remember this, we stop fearing the disease and turn to God. We turn to Him to ask Him to remove the disease from our land. We ask Him to protect us and our neighbors from the ravages of the disease. We ask that He will remove all fear from our hearts.

As we ask, we become mindful of our own sin and unworthiness. So, we repent and trust in God’s undeserved mercy. We remember that God so loved the world that He gave His only Son into death to take away the sin of the world.

If COVID-19 brings you to this humble repentance and trust in the mercy of God, it will be the cause not only of much evil, but of the greatest good possible.

Almighty and Most Merciful God, our heavenly Father, we, Thine erring children, humbly confess unto Thee that we have justly deserved the chastening which for our sins Thou hast sent upon us; but we entreat Thee, of Thy boundless goodness to grant us true repentance, graciously to forgive our sins, to remove from us, or to lighten, our merited punishment, and so to strengthen us by Thy grace that as obedient children we may be subject to Thy will and bear our afflictions in patience; through Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord. Amen.

CrossTalk: Faith, Hope and Love

“So now, faith, hope and love, these three abide; but the greatest of these is love” 1 Corinthians 13:13.

These beautiful words of St. Paul are the conclusion of the great “Love Chapter” included in his letter to the Church at Corinth. Later theologians would call these three the Theological Virtues. They are three distinct aspects of the Christian life, but they are inseparable.

Faith is the foundation. This is a pure gift of the Holy Spirit. Jesus said, “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him” (John 6:44). Faith is the habit of the heart that causes a person to look always at “Jesus Christ and Him crucified” (1 Corinthians 2:2).

In Jesus on the cross we see the power of God at work. There God is defeating Satan. There, by His own blood, He atones for the sin of the world. There, also, God shows us the pattern of the Christian life: that there is life in the midst of death, victory in the appearance of defeat, power and wisdom in what the world judges as weak and foolish.

Hope springs from such faith. Hope is that habit of the heart that is always gazing at the empty grave. Hope sees that Jesus arose on the third day and believes that the faithful, too, shall rise to live before God in everlasting righteousness, innocence and blessedness.

Christian hope is not like the hope of the world. The hope of the world is uncertain. It is more like a wish that may, or may not, come true. But Christian hope is certain. It is the absolute confidence that Jesus’ resurrection guarantees the bodily resurrection of all the faithful.

Nothing, not even death itself, can overcome the love of God which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord. So, hope grounds a person’s life in confidence. Your well-being no longer depends on the fickle world. It does not depend on the wisdom of rulers, or the kindness of others. Christ alone, crucified and risen again, is your protection from every evil.

Therefore, love proceeds from faith and hope. The faith that sees only Jesus Christ crucified and the hope that always sees Him risen from the grave, frees the human heart from every care and worry and turns the eyes outward. In love, you can turn your eyes to your neighbor.

Love looks to others not for what they can give, but for what they need. Just as “God so loved the world, that he gave” (John 3:16), so also the love of a Christian is always giving. This is what makes Christian love unique.

Worldly love is always looking for someone who can fill needs. Godly love sees people not for what they can give, but for what they can receive. That’s why godly love can focus on the smallest, the weakest, the least deserving and the least able to repay.

God’s love reaches out to you not because you are wise or worthy, strong or beautiful, but because you are in need of His love—and He loves to give. This is the greatest news in the universe. The love of God, while undeserved, is unwavering and does not depend on anything other than the suffering, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Faith, hope and love, these are the Theological Virtues, the qualities which flow from God alone. They are not something for you to achieve, but gifts for God to give as an inseparable trinity. Faith begets hope. From faith and hope proceeds love. “And the greatest of these is love” (1 Corinthians 13:13).

CrossTalk: Pentecost, the Forgotten Feast

There are three pivotal events in the life of Jesus. Most people observe two of them as universal holidays. Christmas, celebrating the birth of Jesus, is the biggest one. It is marked by Christmas shopping and a federal holiday on December 25. Easter, celebrating Jesus’ bodily rising from the dead, is the second. Stores are filled with candy eggs and chocolate bunnies.

The third great event in Jesus’ life is Pentecost. It has no national recognition and is sells no merchandise. It is the most forgotten of the three. Let’s take some time today to remember it.

Pentecost is the Greek word for 50. It is easily remembered as the 50th day after Easter. Since Jesus rose from the grave on a Sunday (the first day of the week), Pentecost always falls on a Sunday seven weeks and one day later.

But before we talk about Pentecost as a Christian holiday, we should remember that it was celebrated as a Jewish holiday for 15 centuries before Jesus brought it to its fullness. For those centuries, it was known in Hebrew as Shavuot (Weeks), and in Greek as Pentecost.

Old Testament Pentecost celebrated the events at Mt. Sinai seven weeks after Passover. We should remember what Moses said to Pharaoh: “Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, ‘Let My people go, that they may hold a feast to Me in the wilderness’” (Exodus 5:1).The Exodus was for the purpose of Pentecost!

After the angel of death passed over those houses that had blood on the door posts, the children of Israel crossed the Red Sea on dry ground and traveled to the foot of Mt. Sinai. There, they were constituted as God’s Holy people.

They heard God’s voice speaking from the cloud. They saw the smoke and fire on the top of the Holy Mountain. They received the gift of God’s personal presence in His Holy Tabernacle.

All of this serves to give meaning to the New Testament Pentecost.

During the last true Passover in Israel, Jesus became the true Passover Lamb. He poured out His blood and applies it to everyone who believes and is baptized (Mark 16:16). In this way, Jesus saves you from eternal death—just as the old Passover lamb saved the Israelites from the angel of death.

On the third day, Jesus rose from the grave. His resurrection mirrors the children of Israel who entered the watery grave of the Red Sea chased by Pharaoh’s chariots and emerged as free people on the other side.

St. Luke tells us what happened 50 days after His resurrection. “When the day of Pentecost had fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing, mighty wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them divided tongues, as of fire, and one sat upon each of them” (Acts 2:1-3).

Jesus put the fire of His Holy Spirit on each of the twelve apostles. At Sinai, the fire was on the mountain, and the voice of God had come from out of the cloud. Now, when Pentecost was fulfilled, that fire was on the apostles and God’s word is heard from their mouths.

All this explains why Pentecost should be celebrated as the third important event in the life of Jesus. The apostles are not the real actors. Jesus is. He sent the Holy Spirit. He gave us His ongoing presence. He made His voice heard in Jerusalem, Judea and now, in all the world.

CTQ: Fellowship in Its Necessary Context

In May of 2016, President John Hill asked me to present a paper to the Wyoming District on the topic of the "Overseas Theses" of 1961. The paper that resulted was eventually submitted to the Concordia Theological Quarterly -- the journal for Concordia Theological Seminary in Fort Wayne, Indiana. It was accepted for publication and appeared in the January/April 2020 issue.

Fellowship in Its Necessary Context: 

The Doctrine of the Church and the Overseas Theses of 1961

Why Our Church Decided To Revive In-Person Worship

I am a pastor at a small Lutheran congregation in southeast Michigan, and like many other congregations, my church decided in March to temporarily pause in-person services on account of the coronavirus pandemic, instead posting videos of our services online. At the time, we had to respond quickly to unprecedented circumstances, so we did our best to act in line with Christian principles, even if we could not perfectly communicate exactly why we felt our decisions were appropriate.

Now we’ve had time to reflect and gain clarity. While we still believe we made the right decisions to temporarily pause in-person services, I now believe it’s time for us to start back up. We paused services for one reason: to do our part to slow the initial spread of virus, so our health care system wouldn’t be overwhelmed. It seems that reason has expired.

Continue reading here...

Can the Church ever be Digitized?

Beginning on Tuesday, March 31, our dual parish began looking for ways to broadcast the teaching-content of our public services. This is an attempt both to keep in touch and to continue the instruction of the faithful during these unprecedented days of COVID-19. When the crisis wanes, we will revisit the practice.  Already now, we invite you to think soberly about the plusses and minuses of this practice.

A Guest Essay by the Rev. Dr. Alexey Streltsov: The Covid-19 Pandemic and the Digitization of the Church

On Being a Pro-Life Congregation

Pro-life congregations can find 1,001 things to do. Some of them are as simple as extending communion-rail blessings to the unborn children as well as those born. Others may join the Life Chain on the first Sunday of October or participate in a local March for Life in January. Others may partner with a pregnancy resource center to support mothers in need and so address the fears that drive abortion.

But this article is about being, not doing. Our lives as Christians flow from who we are in Christ. In order to address this foundation, LCMS Life Ministry has provided an important new resource. Marriage, Life and Family: Reflecting the Holy Trinity. It is offered to help congregations and pastors begin to plumb the depths of Lutheran theology through engagement with the most pressing challenges of the day.

Ultimately, LCMS congregations do not engage marriage, life and family as mere social issues. We engage them because through them we have an unprecedented opportunity to proclaim the Father who sends His Son to die for the sins of the world and who, from the cross, gives His Holy Spirit to all who believe.

Engagement with the world today cannot help but see an exponentially increasing chaos. Families are in disarray. Culture is in upheaval. People are set against one another, isolated, angry and hurting. The Christian worldview that once tied communities together has dissolved into rampant nihilism. As a result, the Church is not only marginalized, but attacked with increasing ferocity.

The first step in being a pro-life congregation is to receive these challenges as a gift from God and not a curse to be avoided. No cross can harm God’s people. Knowing this, we can approach the challenges with joy and not foreboding. We can be certain that the more we engage the world with the word of God, the more we will grow.

For Lutherans especially, our respect for the proper distinction between law and Gospel can be exploited by Satan to cause us to be timid and tentative in applying the law to our world. This is disastrous because it mutes three aspects of the Gospel itself.

First, it forgets the beautiful fact that our bodies are created by the very hand of God. His word about how to use them is not a foreign intrusion, but the very words of the One in Whom we live. Second, it also mutes our confession that Christ has died to take away the sin of the world. The promise of the resurrection goes beyond the removal of guilt. It promises freedom from sin itself—freedom from the self-destructive desires and impulses that enslave the human race.

Most importantly of all, marriage, life and family are gifts that God provides to help us see Him in our daily lives. The newest resource from LCMS Life Ministry is designed to start this discussion. It is only a start. But as the LCMS thinks on these matters together, all will benefit from the vistas that God will provide.

Church should be your excuse for missing everything else.

By Grayson Gilbert

"We ought to find delight that we can be united in a local body that functions together in service to one another (1 Cor. 12:12-27). In this unique giftedness being exercised among the members of a local church, particularly through the gifting of teachers, we then come to grow in maturity as we attain to the unity of the faith and knowledge of the Son of God (Eph. 4:11-13). These teachers also equip us for works of service for the edification of that local church body (Eph. 4:12), which in particular is expressed through bearing one another’s burdens (Gal. 6:2), encouraging one another (1 Thess. 4:13-18; 5:11), building each other up in our most holy faith (Jd. 1:20), pushing one another on in perseverance to the end (Heb. 10:23-25), and pouring out compassion (Eph. 4:32), forgiveness (Col. 3:13), love (Jn. 13:34; 1 Jn. 4:7), brotherly devotion (Rom. 12:10)—and even simply putting up with one another (Eph. 4:2)."

This beautiful paragraph is found in a thoughtful and powerful essay that we all do well to read and ponder.

Sixth Annual WPN Conference

How Christianity Invented Religious Freedom

Friday, January 24, 2020

10:00 am Dr. James Tonkowich, The Early Christian Roots of Religious Freedom 

1:30 pm Dr. James Tonkowich, The Christian Ideas that Drove America's Founding Documents

3:30 pm Dr. James Tonkowich, Current Attacks on Religious Liberty 

6:00 pm Banquet
Rev. Jonathan Lange, Christianity's Unique and Essential Contribution to Public Discourse

• Note: Files are linked on Dropbox. The opening screen invites you to sign up for an account, but this is not necessary to downloading the files. Simply decline and move to the file.

PRESENTER

James Tonkowich, D. Min. 
is a Senior Contributor to The Stream, is a freelance writer, speaker and commentator on spirituality, religion and public life who has contributed to a wide variety of opinion websites and publications.
He is the author of The Liberty Threat: The Attack on Religious Freedom in America Today from St. Benedict Press and Pears, Grapes, and Dates: A Good Life After Mid-Life. Jim also serves as Director of Distance Learning at Wyoming Catholic College and is host of the college’s weekly podcast, “The After Dinner Scholar.”

CrossTalk: Serious Sin, Serious Forgiveness

The full and free forgiveness of sins stands at the very heart of the Christian message. Yet, today, both in the Church and in society at large, there is a great deal of confusion about the very nature of sin and why it needs forgiving at all.

That confusion starts with the shallow notion that sin is nothing more than disobedience to the ten commandments. To be sure, it is that. But unless you think more deeply, you will likely consider these commandments to be nothing more than a random list of rules.

When you think of the commandments as a random list of rules—whether given by God or given by the Church—you will never understand the enormous cost of breaking them.

Secular contempt for religion comes from the false idea that an ancient and out-of-touch hierarchy (the Church) is trying to impose morality on the rest of the world. But Christians who replace the arbitrary dictates of men with the arbitrary dictates of God don’t improve matters very much.

While it is true—even vital—to understand that God is the source of all morality, you will not understand the nature of sin until you understand that God’s commands are not arbitrary.

The truth is that the commandments start with creation. The human body, by nature, cannot tolerate certain things. If it gets too hot or too cold, you die. A long fall or a bullet can kill you. Poison will do you in. You don’t need to be told these things. You can learn them from experience.

But there are also dangers to human life that are less obvious but just as deadly. These we are told about in the ten commandments.

If you trust God, you will take his word for it. If you don’t trust Him, you may reject His guidance. But either way, breaking the ten commandments does the same irreparable harm to human life. “In the day you eat of it, you shall surely die” (Genesis 2:17 ESV).

Now we are to the real point. God teaches the ten commandments not as an arbitrary list of “dos” and “don’ts” but as the very structure of human life. To break them is to break life itself.

Sins are like arsenic taken into the body. Once there, it inexorably works death. There is no antidote. Nothing can slow its destructive effect. Nothing can remove it from the body.

A single sin and death is inevitable. It is entirely impossible for sin to enter into a body without working death. Is that all there is to say? Are we simply destined for death? Yes, and no.

While there is absolutely nothing—not even God—that can stop the deadly effect of sin, there is a solution that only God can offer. He, and He alone, can absorb the deadly effects of sin in Himself. In fact, that is exactly what He has done.

“When Christ came into the world, he said, ‘Sacrifices and offerings you have not desired, but a body you have prepared for me’” (Hebrews 10:5). In Christ, God has made Himself a body in which to absorb all of sin’s poison.

“The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). That will never change. But Jesus has provided a way to take that death into Himself. That is called “forgiveness.” That is the Good News at the heart of the Christian faith.

While sin is far more serious than you ever thought, Christ’s forgiveness is even more serious, still. “By believing, you may have life in his name” (John 20:31).