February 2022 – What Does This Mean?

Luther Attempts to Calm a Storm

On his visit to Wittenberg in December 1521, Junker Jörg had a chance to speak with and overhear conversations between everyday Germans. What he learned disturbed him greatly. He sensed anger against the Church and her abuses and general unease among common people. He likely read several of the extreme pamphlets, some threatening violence and rebellion.

For months he had been haunted by the possibility that events could get out of hand. The Electoral Saxon Court was also worried. Not entirely successfully, the Elector forbid the changes being made by Luther’s followers and university students for the time being. Yet many of the changes being made by impatient reformers were ideas he himself had advanced. The end to private masses, distribution of both elements in the Lord’s Supper and an end to monastic celibacy were among these reforms. He vowed to write and discourage the former while encouraging the latter.

In the summer of 1521, from the safety of the Wartburg, Luther wrote a treatise De abroganda missa privata Martini Lutheri sententia (The Misuse Of The Mass [AE 36:129ff]) to help those engaged in beginning to reform the Mass. He explained his chief objections and the reasons why he opposed them so that reformers would have good arguments to employ. He argued for the distribution of the Lord’s Supper in both kinds and the end of private masses, said to accumulate merit for souls in purgatory, He concluded that these practices rested on several false doctrines, that the priesthood is a separate and superior class of Christians and that their work is primarily about sacrifice. Instead, all Christians are priests, the work of the priesthood is preaching, not sacrifice and that the mass itself is not a sacrifice at all, but a promise given by Christ to be received in faith. He sent the work to George Spalatin, Elector Frederick’s secretary, who decided not to publish it. In the meantime, Luther worked from notes to prepare a German version, Uom Missbrauch der Messen When Luther found out the book hadn’t been published, he demanded the publication of Misuse of the Mass under threat to write something more inflammatory. Both versions were first published in January of 1522.

He also sent Spalatin a book to urge his followers not to resort to insurrection. The work, Treue Vermahnung zu allen Christen (A Sincere Admonition by Martin Luther to All Christians to Guard Against Insurrection and Rebellion) appeared in early 1522. In the book, Luther argued that insurrection was forbidden by God. He had given authority to punish and compel reform to the government and it must remain with them. It is the role of the common man to point out where reform is needed, pray for it and urge their rulers to enact it and not to participate in abuses. They ought to trust God to act on their behalf. In the conclusion to this work, Luther asks that his followers not call themselves Lutheran. “What is Luther? After all, the teaching is not mine. Neither was I crucified for anyone.… How then should I—poor stinking maggot-fodder that I am—come to have men call the children of Christ by my wretched name?” (Martin Brecht, Martin Luther: Shaping and Defining the Reformation, 1521–1532, trans. James L. Schaaf (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1994), 32.)

What If They’re Not A Visitor?

The Lutheran church is often maligned for her lack of friendliness. We are well aware of the issue. We even assign greeters to welcome folks as they come into the building. Just like the back pew preference, I suppose we’re not alone in Christendom in this either. But, is there a possibility that there’s another underlying issue?

I’ve concluded over the years that some of our chilly interaction is caused by fear. Not some introverted fear of interaction itself, but a fear of being exposed or causing great pearl clutching offense. Both, I suspect, originate from the same source.

We’re afraid to greet a strange face, because they might be an infrequent, long-time member. We fear offending them and chasing them off. We also fear being exposed as a newbie, regardless of how many years are under our belts, in the face of a generational member, who deserves more credit than us.

To the second concern, impostor syndrome is a real thing. In most of the rest of our lives, it’s sort of an irrational fear. But in Christianity, it’s legitimate. We come to confess our sins, hear the absolution, hear the word of God, and receive his gifts of forgiveness of sins life and salvation. We do it often, constantly reminding ourselves that we don’t belong or deserve these gifts. Baptized into Christ, we are imposters no more. We are grafted into the body of Christ. We are members of the one body, the one family of faith.

The fear of offense is also legitimate. But, we should not be paralyzed by it. The misidentified delinquent member may get mad, but they lack standing in the case. They are the ones who’ve hidden their faces from the congregation. They are the ones who’ve absented themselves from the place where God promised to deliver his blessings to His people.

Think of it this way: Attendance is membership. Membership is not a listing on the membership roll caused by a protracted failure to clean-up the rolls, not a ancient familial connection, not a community presence, not a huge donation in the recent or distant past. “I don’t have to go to church to be a Christian” you’ll often hear.

That’s true but consider this. “Just a like a fish doesn’t have to be in water to be a fish. What happens to that fish when you take it out of the water for too long?” (Tyler Edwards, “Do You Really Have To Go To Church Every Sunday,” Relevant Magazine, 2017). God gives us His church to keep us in the faith and guard us against the Devil, the world, and our sinful flesh.

Our fear can block us from serving those returning folks and, more importantly missing new visitors among us. By simply not engaging, we won’t be exposed or hurt somebody’s feelings. At what cost? How many folks have visited among us without a word from the person sharing their pew, seated behind, or seated in front of them? How many people did we miss getting to know and folding into this body of faith?

You Are the Church! A simple word of greeting from one individual to another can make all the difference in the world to that person you don’t know yet. “Hi, my name is Esmerelda, and you are?” “Can I show you how to use that bulletin?” “We’re on page 167.” Even the simplest things can make their scary visit more comfortable. It can’t be done by formatting of the bulletin, welcome banners, or uncomfortable announcements. It can be done by each of us offering a word greeting or assistance.

That’s also true of the long delinquent member too. They may have forgotten what comes next, or never learned in the first place. If you don’t know them, they prob’ly don’t know you either. We’re here for the same reason. We come to the house of the Lord to hear and receive that forgiveness bought for us by the death of Jesus.

Let us attend to the house of the Lord.

Rev. Jason M. Kaspar
Mt. Calvary Lutheran Church & Preschool
La Grange, TX

Rev. Brent Keller’s Bio Updated

Pastor Brent Keller was recently installed as pastor of Trinity Lutheran Church in Guttenberg, Iowa and St. Paul Lutheran Church in McGregor, Iowa. His bio has been updated at: https://whatdoesthismean.blog/meet-rev-brent-keller/

Does God Still Speak Directly To Us?

Yes, of course God still speaks to us. He speaks directly to us each week, when we hear His Word. When your pastor says, “in the stead and by the command of my Lord, Jesus Christ, I forgive you all of your sins.” We are to hear the words as if Jesus Himself spoke them to us just now. The Divine Service on Sunday morning is all about the Lord speaking to us.

But, that’s not really the question, is it?

Your Aunt Beatrice, who now calls herself, Sister Mooncloud, means something entirely different. She or Uncle Stinging-rain say that God speaks directly to them. They’ve told you that they are more in touch with the Spirit of the Almighty in some way.

The method doesn’t matter. What matters is content.

A prophet is simply one who hears and reports the Word of the Lord. A true prophet cannot speak falsely. Moses warned the people of Israel, and us, too, that false prophets are coming, and here’s how you will know. “And if you say in your heart, ‘How may we know the word that the Lord has not spoken?’— when a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the word does not come to pass or come true, that is a word that the Lord has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You need not be afraid of him.” (Deuteronomy 18:21-22)

Always, the prophet must speak truth. If Uncle Stinging-rain or Auntie Mooncloud say a thing purporting to be the voice of God, it must come true as they have said. If the Senate doesn’t overturn the election, the comet doesn’t strike the earth, Mom and Dad don’t die at the appointed time, or the market doesn’t have a cataclysmic reaction, then the prophesy and the prophet are false.

Even the remedy given by the Lord through Mosses reflects a curious disdain. “You need not be afraid of him.” The proscribed reaction here isn’t fisticuffs, scourging, or stoning. It’s indifference. Have no fear, de-escalate, disengage.

All prophesy must point to Jesus and Him crucified for our sins. You and I may not always readily see it. But, it is the case to be sure. On the road to Emmaus, two of the followers of Jesus received clear teaching on their seven mile walk from Jesus himself after the resurrection. “And he said to them, ‘O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?’ And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself.” (Acts 2:25-27)

“But, Pastor Kaspar, what about St. Peter’s Pentecost sermon concerning visions? Doesn’t that indicate a renewed prophesy?” That’s a fine question. When Peter and the disciples spoke in tongues, speaking all the languages of the people present, He did preach about prophecy. But, what does he actually say?

“But this is what was uttered through the prophet Joel: ‘And in the last days it shall be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams; … before the day of the Lord comes, the great and magnificent day. And it shall come to pass that everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.’

Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know — this Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it.” (Acts 2:16-17, 20b-24)

Jesus taught on the Emmaus road: all prophecy is of Him. Peter also preached the same from the prophecy of St. Joel, chapter two. The prophet spoke of Jesus. The day of prophesy is the day of salvation. It’s the day of Jesus. For you, that day is today.

The writer of Hebrews puts a fine point on it too. “In many and various ways, God spoke to His people of old by the prophets. But now in these last days, He has spoken to us by His Son.” (Hebrews 1:1-2a) We have prophecy. But, the whole of it points to Jesus and his work saving us.

And St. Peter teaches us in His second epistle, chapter one, “For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty … And we have something more sure, the prophetic word, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts, knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation.” (2 Peter 1:16, 18-20)

We have the interpretation: the saving work of Jesus for us. Now, also we have the lens through which prophecy is revealed to us. We have Jesus and the scripture attesting to Him. Anything else is false prophecy. Fear not, dear Christians, ignore those words.

Let us prophesy of Jesus alone, and the work He has done.

Rev. Jason M. Kaspar
Mt. Calvary Lutheran Church & Preschool
La Grange, TX

A Christian Logo Design

Photograpic basis for the design by Rev. Jason M. Kaspar

The new logo for Mt. Calvary Lutheran Church & Preschool of La Grange, TX features two elements of our ecclesiastical architecture. Both our pulpit and lectern walls within the chancel feature the same brick form. These two features flank the large chancel cross.

In church architecture, we should always see the numbers before our eyes as deliberate and pedagogical. The repeated features in church sanctuaries are generally done on purpose. They also serve to teach about the Christian faith, reminding us about something significant.

These numbers include fours for the Gospel writers, sixes for creation and the fall into sin, sevens for holiness, tens for the completeness of all peoples, and twelves for holy completeness. Our sanctuary also makes use of numbers to teach us about the Christian faith.

The brickwork flanking the cross has a central column consisting of two independent bricks and a continuous column. In the church threes are a Trinitarian symbol. The Trinity is, then, core upon which eight horizontal bars hang. Eights in the church are symbols of resurrection, recreation, new life in Christ, and baptism.

In six days, The Lord created the Heavens and the Earth. On the Seventh day, He rested. After the fall, the eight day becomes a symbol of the promised redeemer. In Genesis 3:15 we hear, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.”

In the flood, eight souls are preserved in the ark. They are preserved by water, which also washes way the wickedness of the earth. St. Peter teaches us in 1 Peter 3 “20because they formerly did not obey, when God’s patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through water. 21Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.”

All Jewish males are circumcised as a mark of God’s covenant with His people. This circumcision is proscribed for the eight day of life. That Genesis 3 promise is tied to the eight day.

Jesus’ resurrection is an eighth day event. He is crucified and dies on Friday. He is entombed in death from Friday through the entirety of the Sabbath (the seventh day), and is raised again from the dead on the eighth day.

In Colossians, chapter two, St. Paul teaches us to understand baptism from circumcision. “11In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, 12having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead. 13And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses.”

These two Trinitarian Baptismal symbols on both sides of our altar point our eyes to the source of our salvation. In baptism, we receive the forgiveness of sins AND the faith, which clings to that promise. The forgiveness purchased and won by Jesus’ crucifixion and death on a cross. A symbol of death promising us eternal life.

Let us ever glory in that baptismal promise.

Rev. Jason M. Kaspar
Mt. Calvary Lutheran Church & Preschool
La Grange, TX