Pious Lutheran

Presentation of the Augsburg Confession,  St. John's Church in Schweinfurt, late 16th Cent. Having the courage to confess the truth of scripture Historical details Courage is fearing God instead of man Confessing the truth requires we love both God and man, but in that order Are you willing to die on that hill? Usually that’s a question asked in order to convince someone to back down from their position. That’s fair, not every hill is worth dying on. But, when it comes to our faith in God, that is a hill we must die on. The Lutheran reformers 500 years ago realized that. October 31st, 1517 is popularly known as Reformation Day among us. Although, to be frank, it wasn’t a particularly significant day in history, since Martin Luther just posted the 95 Theses in Wittenberg, and his theses weren’t very good. But June 25th, 1530, although not widely known, is a much more significant day in history. On that day we see that our Lutheran forefathers had the courage to confess the truth of ...

The Poor, the Lame, and the Blind called into the Supper,  The Story Bible from Genesis to Revelation, 1873 Evangelism Evangelism is inviting people to God’s feast. The invitation goes out to all, but some reject it. Regardless, God’s Kingdom will be full. How did you become a Christian? How is it that you’re sitting in these pews right now? Different people have different stories. Maybe you were baptized as a baby and never knew anything different. Or maybe sometime later in life you had some experience that ultimately brought you to faith in Jesus. Whatever it is that brought you here it all boils down to the same thing: somebody evangelized you and you heard the invitation to God’s feast. That’s what today’s Gospel reading focuses on: evangelism. “ A man once gave a great banquet and invited many. ” Often when we think of evangelism we think exclusively of telling the Gospel to someone who has never heard it before. That’s certainly evangelism, but evangelism is more than that. ...

St. Barnabas Healing the Sick,  Paolo Veronese, circa 1556 Generosity and Encouragement Barnabas was generous and encouraging What it means for us to be generous What it means for us to encourage A blessed feast of St. Barnabas to you dear friends in Christ! Many of the saints in the bible don’t always behave rather saintly, and we see many of their character flaws. Barnabas, however, isn’t that way. Throughout the book of Acts he is known for his generosity and encouragement. For that reason Barnabas is a wonderful example to us of what it means to be generous and how to encourage one another. Barnabas was a Levite from the Island of Cyprus, a small but very fertile and rich island. He was originally named Joseph, but the apostles called him Barnabas, meaning son of encouragement. He’s introduced to us in the Bible when he sold one of his fields and gave the money to the apostles to be distributed among the needy christians and support the work of the ministry. Later, after St. Pa...