Part of the reason for the gross liturgical confusion that reigns in western Christianity is that we don't know the proper designation for the thing in which the church catholic engages every Lord's (Christ's) Day. The Greek Church gets it right so let's start there. Among them the Sunday morning event is called: The Divine And Holy Liturgy. When you drive by their church...

Many throughout church history, early fathers as well as the latest critical scholars, have assumed that either the synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke) must perfectly agree with one another, or the church cannot claim that they are divinely inspired and true. This has worried Christians for so long that Tatian, a 2nd century apologist, created his Diatessaron. It was...

St. John Chrysostom is one of the greatest teachers the church has ever known. The following homily is one example of why he was given the title Chrysostom, which means golden-mouth. Chrysostom. Writing On The Blood Typology Let us then return from the [Communion] table like lions breathing fire, having become terrible to the devil; thinking on our Head [Christ] and on t...

Christ Lutheran Church is blessed to have an accomplished Lutheran organist who is a talented hymnist as well. This recently written hymn gives Christians hope "even when steeples are falling." The melody is Consolation (The King Shall Come). Though castles burn and kings are slainThough kingdoms grow and flameThough war destroy the peaceful plainWe rest in baptized frame...

This is a portion of a sermon preached by Rev. Carl Ferdinand Wilhelm Walther, Lutheran Pioneer in America, 1st President of the (current) LCMS, founder of Concordia Seminary St. Louis, MO....

On January 1st the church celebrates the Feast of the Lord's Circumcision. According to Old Testament law a son was to be circumcised on the 8th day; and so Jesus who was "made under the law" (Gal. 4:4) was presented for this Old Testament type of Baptism. While "this Cup" of his blood IS the New Covenant, it was at 8 days of age that divine blood was first spilled: fo...

Our God invites all men, through Simeon the Prophet, to "Behold! This Child!" To know, love and serve him, and to participate in his Light and Life. It is remarkable to me that even in this late age of unbelief, where it is fashionable for the "heathen to rage against the LORD and his Christ," the power that this little baby has. For one day a year, across the whole wes...

The idea of Eucharistic Sacrifice sends Lutherans running for the hills. Luther, in his writings, demolished the notion and has wiped it from the minds of Lutherans for five hundred years so far. He wrote against the abuses of it. The (alleged) RC teaching that Christ dies again at every Eucharist. While some RC's taught this at certain times and places, such a teaching i...

For some time now I have posited that as Liturgy is Scripture, Scripture is also Liturgy. What does this mean? Let us begin by asserting what Scripture is not. To this author Sacred Scripture is not a record book of previous believers' interaction with God. It is not a history book (though ample history can be learned from it). It is not reportage, something written mer...

There are two parts of the Christian faith that are hard to believe. First that we have sinned against God, secondly that pardon and remission of sins comes through the blood of Christ, as received in the Word and Sacraments. But however much humanity may deny the reality of divine law, its violation and its consequences (death); or recast it in terms of psychology, socio...