The Burr in the Burgh

The torture and murder of Jesus Christ is one of the strangest events in all of human history. How utterly embarrassing this must have been for the first disciples....

Jesus was a mysterious figure in his day. Some people believed that He was the One sent from God who would set everything right. Others believed he was a dangerous fraud. But I suspect that for many average Joe Israelites, the jury was still out. A lot of them probably thought, “Well maybe he is the Savior. Let’s wait and see what happens.” And for those many who were in the mushy middle, the death of Jesus on the cross must have been supremely disappointing. Crucifixion was such a shameful way to die that the average Jew at the time would have thought that God surely would not allow a righteous man to suffer innocently that way. The fact that He did not save Himself and the fact that God did not come to his aid was proof positive, for many, that Jesus may have been a lot of things, but the Messiah he was not....

You know about His sufferings because you’ve seen it in movies, heard about it in sermons and read it in the bible for yourselves.

He was arrested and falsely accused. His friends abandoned him. The guards mocked him and spat on him. They ripped his beard off his chin. They struck him with rods and with their fists.

Then came the flogging, the terrible brutal torture with the scourge. Long leather straps with bits of metal and bone so that it catches the skin and shreds it like paper. After a good thorough lashing, Jesus’ flesh hung off his back in quivering strips of bleeding meat.

Then came the crown of thorns pressed hard upon his brow. And the Romans always crucified you naked, adding insult to injury. So they nailed him up, bare and bleeding, in between two thieves. And they left him there to die.

Only his mother and one or two others were there to comfort him. But what kind of man wants His mother to witness His execution. Her presence there probably brought to Jesus more grief than solace.

But all of that – as terrible as it most undoubtedly was – was nothing. That was a piece of cake. All the Romans could do was poke and jab His body. It’s not what happened before the cross that hurt Jesus the most. It’s what happened ON the cross. For there God laid upon Him the iniquity of us all. The anguish of having to bear the weight of the guilt of every sinner’s sin far overpowered the nails and lashes. And God despised His Son. He poured out His vengeance and wrath onto Jesus. And for those moments while he hung there, suspended between earth and sky, Jesus of Nazareth was the most cursed human being of all time.

As you return home this evening, take a moment and think this over very carefully. It is because you lied, that Jesus died. It is because you were unkind that Jesus suffered. It is because you are selfish that Jesus bled. It was because of you. You did this. It’s your fault. ...

In a sermon on the death of Christ, Martin Luther wrote, “You should deeply believe, and never doubt, that in fact you are the one who killed Christ. Your sins did this to Him. Therefore, when you look at the nails being driven through His hands, firmly believe that it is your work. Do you see His crown of thorns? Those thorns are your wicked thoughts.”

But don’t despair. No one did anything to Jesus that He did not allow them to do. He gave Himself into death for our salvation. He submitted to these sufferings willingly, to pay for your sins, to satisfy the wrath of God, and to spare us from going to hell....

My prayer is that each of every one of you will be able to go home tonight with the assurance that whatever you may have done, whatever lies upon your conscience, that you have been reconciled with your Heavenly Father. ...

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This is one reason the Lutheran Church -Missouri Synod (LCMS) is not in fellowship with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA).

Oh, certainly the LCMS has problems of its own. There is no flawless denomination. But the spirit of a church body can be discerned not only by what it teaches, but also by what it allows.

People who believe in biblical inerrancy and oppose womens ordination (on biblical grounds) are not welcome in the ELCA. But goddess worshippers and gay activists are.

Go to Her Church.Org, the website of Ebenezer Lutheran Church in San Francisco. You can read all about their goddess worship, their goddess rosaries, the Gay/Lesbian promotions, etc.

There are still biblically sound pastors and people in the ELCA, to be sure, but the tolerance of these theological extremes suggests that, as a church body, they've sold their soul.

In the picture at the top, devotion is paid to little pagan fertility goddesses. Yahweh commanded Israel to slay all the Canaanites because he knew that His people could be easily lured into practicing local fertility rites, such as temple prostitution. What God condemned is now being endorsed in this ELCA congregation.


And I'm not sure what the lower photo is supposed to communicate. It appears next to text stating that homosexuality and practicing homosexuals are embraced in their communion.

[A Word on Homosexuality: Both the Old Testament and the New Testament clearly and repeatedly condemn homosexuality as sinful. It is contrary to God's created plan for humankind. I don't believe it is a more damning sin that hetersexual lust, fornication or adulterty. But it is certainly not less. A person who has homosexual temptations and recognizes his or her sin and seeks God's pardon through Christ is indeed welcome at our church. The impenitent are welcome also but with the hopes that the Law of God will enlighten them and drive them in humility - with all other sinners - to the cross of Jesus.]

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OK, one more final post about the Gnostic Gospel of Judas.

Over at Mere Comments, I found this disturbing set of statistics. The question is: "Do you believe that, after you die, your physical body will be resurrected someday?"

Only 36% responded yes. Only 50% of those who've attended church recently said yes. You can see the details for yourself here.

Even though it gets recited just about every Sunday in many-if-not-most American churches, people don't believe the Creed. "I believe in the resurrection of the body." And I contend that one reason is because pastors do not preach it clearly enough. We preach the gospel as if the point is just to save your soul.

Interestingly, when God created Adam and Eve in His image and likeness, He did not just create spirit beings. When the eternal Logos came to redeem humanity, he became flesh and arose in the flesh. And the apostle (1 Cor 15) clearly teaches a resurrection on the Last Day.

If you believe that the REAL you is your soul/mind/spirit and that your body is just a shell or dispensible container, then guess what, you are a gnostic. If you believe the soul is what matters and the body is unimportant, guess what, you are a gnostic. If you believe that eternal life consists of remaining disembodied forever, yep, you are a gnostic. The Christian religion, however, confesses the resurrection and glorification of the body, that you will live forever as body and soul.

But the fact that so few church goers know that is, at least to great degree, a failure of the clergy, the shepherds who are called to feed Christ's flock with the truths of his word.

Here is a test. St. John said to test the spirits.

1. Did your pastor clearly preach the bodily resurrection of Jesus on Easter?


2. Did your pastor make the connection between the resurrection of Jesus and your own resurrection?


3. At funerals, does your pastor consistently preach about the resurrection or does he just talk about Aunt Mildred's soul?

We do not confess that you die, you go to heaven, end of story. We preach you die, you await the resurrection, you are raised glorified, you reign with Christ eternally.

I'd love to hear your comments about the three questions above.

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I had decided not to waste any more time blogging on the Gnostic Gosepl of Judas. I fully concur with The Beast that if Christians would pay more attention to Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, then Judas would be less an issue. But I like the title from Daylight so much that I couldn't resist.

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Darrell at The Southern Conservative posts his views after seeing the television special about this Gospel of Judas. I agree with Darrell that Christians ought to read - or at least become familiar with - some of these ancient gnostic texts. Not because they have any spiritual value but because of their historical importance.

In our time, when people are eager to reject established sources of authority, when victimization is in vogue, when minds are unusually open to conspiracy thinking, Christian people must know more about the origins of Christianity and the development of the Biblical cannon. If pastors, scholars and especially average lay people do not become more conversant with these issues, then crap writers like Dan Brown and historical revisionists will carry the hour. And practically speaking, that could equal souls lost.

Dr. Elaine Pagels of Princeton University has been asserting for decades that there were numerous competing theologies in the early period of the Jesus movement. And through political machinations, the so-called orthodox party managed to suppress its competitors, including Gnosticism. And ever since then, the church has been tyrannized by Dead White European Males, the dreaded D.W.E.M.S. Or so the theory goes.

Dr. Albert Mohler offers this very lucid treatment to help us know fact from hype. But let's be clear here. NO ONE is saying that this newly translated text was actually written by Judas, the disciple who betrayed Jesus. NO ONE is even saying it comes from the apostolic era.

Apparently, there is some reference to the Gospel of Judas in Irenaeus which would put it from the late second century. These gnostic texts all seem to date from the late 2nd or 3rd century. And while some of these texts may have circulated quite a bit, none of them enjoyed anything close to a widespread reception from ancient congregations.

In order for a book to have been welcomed as Scripture in ancient Christian communities, it had to have bona fide apostolic origin. In other words, was it TRULY written by an apostle or a close associate of the apostles? That was the fundamental criterion for the reception of a letter or text. Those pseudapigraphic texts like the Gospels of Thomas or Judas simply did not meet the test.

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Uncommon Descent is the Intelligent Design weblog of Dr. William Dembski and friends.

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You may have heard - and certainly will be hearing more - about this alleged "Gospel of Judas." This is really much ado about doo doo. From what I understand, the "Gospel of Judas" is just another old gnostic pseudapigraphic text. Judas didn't write it any more than Thomas wrote the gospel of Thomas. Gnostics were people who held to a varied set of heretical teachings. There were numerous such sects in the early centuries of Christianity.

Common themes in gnostic texts include:

• The Highest God did not create the world, some lower deity or emanation of God did.
  
• The material world is evil
• Only spirit is good
• Thus, gnostics tended to promote celibacy because the body doesn't matter.
• Some went the opposite direction and lived licentiously because the body doesn't matter.
• Women were often denigrated. The "Gospel of Thomas" states that a woman (Mary Magdalene) must become a man in order to be saved.
• The Logos (eternal only-begotten Son of God) was not incarnated. The true God could not become a man because the material world is evil.
• One theory was that Jesus was not truly human, he only appeared to be flesh and blood.
• Another theory suggested that Jesus wasn't any more divine than you or I.
• Because the material world is intrinsically evil, Jesus did not rise bodily from the grave.
• Because the material world is evil, Christians do not receive His body and blood in the Eucharist.
• Because the material world is evil, salvation means being set free from the body.
• Because the material world is intrinsically evil, you will not rise bodily on the Last Day.
• The word Gnosticism comes from the Greek word for knowledge (gnosis). Gnostics held that Jesus passed on certain teachings only to a few. And these secret teachings are passed along only to the worthy. So only those ascended masters, the enlightened ones, who posseses this secret knowledge gain the highest salvation.

And so forth. Does that sound anything at all like Christianity? If you believe ANY of the above statements, you cannot in good conscience speak the Nicene Creed. And if you cannot honestly confess the Nicene Creed, you are not a Christian.

Soon, I will be preparing a series of lectures on the Da Vinci Code, so you will be reading more from me on these matters.

Christianity Today has a nice write up on this which I recommend you read.

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I was reading LCMS news maven, Miss Mollie Ziegler, at Get Religion and discovered a very helpful website called Quack Watch. I'm not a doctor and so I'm not qualified to evaluate all of the information on Quack Watch. But I do believe people need to do a bit of level-headed research before embracing so-called alternative medicines and therapies. It's amazing how much quasi-voodoo superstitious nonsense people will accept. Such things as Reiki, therapeutic touch, chakras, aromatherapy, reflexology, past lives therapy and so forth are bewitching legions of otherwise reasonable Americans.

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I'm doing some serious thought these days on topics related to bio-ethics. And this afternoon, I've been pondering the internal process involved in making a tough ethical decision. Tell me, if you are faced with a difficult ethical decision - such as the Terri Schiavo case - which of these factors are most important in how you arrive at a decision:

• How will this affect me?
• Will I be burdened or inconvenienced?
  
• What do I want?
• What do I think the person would want?
• What is the financial cost?
• Does God's Word provide any guidance?
• Is one decision more in line with traditional Christian living?

You see, I think Dr. Richard Eyer is correct in his little book: Holy People, Holy Lives: Law and Gospel in Bioethics. He writes that people today usually think in terms of what is practical and/or what do I want. In other words, they make decisions according to whether it is pragmatically and emotionally satisfying instead of which course of action most reflects the mind of Christ as revealed in Scripture and 2 millenia of Christian reflection.

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You need to read this movie review by Dr. Angus Menuge over at The Pearcey Report.

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John and Nancy Pearcey run the Pearcey Report webzine. I just discovered it and will be adding it to my daily read list. You must read Nancy Pearcey's book Total Truth: Liberating Christianity from Its Cultural Captivity.

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I still love this stuff. Buy an egg every couple of months or so. Here you can get me a giant five pound blob.

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One of my favorite characters in the Chronicles of Narnia is Reepicheep the mouse. Well, guess who's going to be his voice for the Prince Caspian movie. See here.

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Hi all,
Today we had a very successful seminar on Intelligent Design with Dr. Angus Menuge of Concordia University, WI. Turnout was delightfully higher than expected and people came from all over the city, as well as some from Ohio.

We are just now in the process of building our church website and will very soon have Dr. Menuge's powerpoint presentation available for viewing there.

One favorite quote came from C.S. Lewis who talked about chronological snobbery. I heard it somewhere said that just because it's newer doesn't mean it's truer.

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Take a look at one of my favorite Lutheran blogs: What You Do, Do Quickly, from whom I shamelessly have "borrowed" the image to the left. I just think it aptly illustrates a sad indictment against major streams of contemporary Christianity: the blight of cross-less-ness.

It stuns me when I listen to highly respected Christian preachers on the radio or television who preach and preach and preach, but fail to mention the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Sometimes I catch Charles Stanley when I'm in the car and when I do, I always listen. He's a gifted communicator, in my opinion. Gives lots of good biblical advice. He just doesn't preach the gospel very much - at least from what I have heard. (Maybe I just tuned in on the wrong days). Oh, he mentions God A LOT. He's very God-centered, to be sure. But there is a diff between being God-centered and being Christ-centered. A few days ago, I listened to one of his sermons and thought afterwards that any Mormon could have delivered that message. That was a really good Mormon lecture on ethics. And we wonder why most evangelicals, in surveys, still think that you basically get to heaven by faith plus works. Come to think of it, can you really be called an EVANGELICAL if you don't understand forensic justification? What then is the "evangel?"

You see, if you ask a person what the main message of Christianity is and they say it's something like:

• Love. Love God and love your neighbor.
• Following Jesus.
• Being totally committed to Christ in everything you do.
• Believe in God and follow His commandment

...then they maybe haven't grasped the central notions of sin & grace, the nature of God, the incarnation of the eternal Logos, the life, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus, the outpouring of the Spirit at Pentecost, etc.

I am a regular guest on a local radio talk program Sunday nights 9:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. Two Lutheran pastors and one layman hashing stuff out and taking calls. A couple of weeks ago, we were talking about revivalist Charles Finney with Dr. Lawrence Rast from Concordia Theological Seminary in Ft. Wayne, IN. We discussed the "new measures" Finney employed to gain converts. And as we were criticizing the stress on gimickry and emotional manipulation of Finney (not to mention his rank heresies), a caller phoned with a question. He said his church won't allow you to join unless you can report having had an experience of conversion and a dedication to Christ. We had been talking about altar calls and the like. As we chatted, he wanted to be able to point to a moment in time when a person commits himself to Jesus as the moment of personal regeneration. He was confusing faith with commitment. Or justification with sanctification. At the end of the call, he accused us of "easy-believism" because we were emphasizing salvation by grace through faith alone.

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Does this worry anyone besides me?

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I urge you to go read this very fine post by The Beast. And please, write him an encouraging comment. He has, in my opinion, expressed clearly the way God's accusations and God's promises work together. Judgment and Mercy. Wrath and Grace. And how one w/o the other is lame.

He also picks up on one of the greatest blights on the American church: the Church Growth Movement. We are all in favor of the church growing. I didn't become a pastor because I want the church to shrivel and die. I take the mission of the church very much to heart, believe you me. But true spiritual growth is often not quantifiable. You can't count it. As one of my professors, tongue in cheek, said, "Numbers is not the only book in the bible." Sometimes, right preaching of the Word will cause the number of believers to increase. Other times, it will drive them away. After all, the cross is an offense to natural man.

As Mother Theresa said, "We are called to be faithful, not necessarily successful." And those who water down the message in order to put butts in the pews are not helping anyone. I tell people that we have got to get over this obsession with the A B Cs of church life (Attendance, Buildings, and Cash).

Let's keep the message straight. Let's get the message out. And then let's let the Holy Spirit do his job. Let God be God.

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This is priceless.

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Mark Twain once said that everyone complains about the weather but nobody does anything about it. As Frederica Mathewes-Green says in this recent piece in Christianity Today, instead of trying to change the weather, maybe we should pay more attention to sheltering a few individuals from the storm.

Christians in America are so caught up in fighting the culture wars, that they risk losing a much bigger battle. Whether Roman Catholics or Evangelicals, we talk about overturning Roe and cleaning up prime-time T.V. but think too little about humility and grace. Instead of focusing on something as amorphous as "the culture," perhaps we should concentrate on serving our neighbor through our vocations.

I support many of the causes typically espoused by traditionalist Christians in these so-called culture wars, but FMG has a point. Let's not miss the trees for the forest.

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A Baptist youth minister with a penchant for gruesome horror movies. Right on! I enjoy the blog of Philip Meade over at The Beast's Lair and wish he would post more often. And one question I'd pose is this: Why do so many contemporary Japanese horror flicks (and their American re-makes) center on murdered children? (Ie. The Ring, The Grudge, Dark Water, Three Extremes)

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