Anthropology – Page 4 – What Does This Mean?

The Problem With Revivalism

The event, which recently wrapped-up at Asbury University, is called an outbreak by folks in those revivalist circles. “A student praying in the chapel broke out into”, “a prayer meeting the dormitory spilled out onto the streets and became”, or “a student’s testimony broke into a revival lasting [a number of] days.” That’s how the Asbury College website describes their own history of great revivals in 1905, 1908, 1921, 1950, 1958, 1970, and 2023. No mention is made of the lesser revivals that didn’t breakout adequately.

Who are these Asbury University folks?

They identify themselves as a nondenominational Christian college turned university. Nondenominational is a disingenuous category. There’s always a denominational precedent leaving its mark on the organization into the future. Typically that nondenominational root is Baptist. Not so for Asbury, they are product of the Wesleyan-Holiness Movement. The movement comes from a 19th Century mingling of Methodism, Quakerism, Anabaptism, and Restorationism.

The Holiness Churches reject infant baptism, infant faith, and the view that God creates faith in us (monergism). Instead, these churches teach a synergistic view that we generate faith within ourselves as an act of our will. This runs contrary to the clear teaching of Scriptures like “For by grace you have been saved through faith and this is not your own doing; It is a gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.” (Ephesians 2:8-9) And, “Yet you are he who took me from the womb; You made me trust you at my mother’s breasts. On you was I cast from my birth, and from my mother’s womb you have been my God.” (Psalm 22:9-10)

The Holiness crowd also places a strong emphasis on the “Second Work of Grace.” Namely, after coming to faith, a Christian is completely free from sin’s grip. In the future, Christian perfection is an achievable goal. This goal must be the aim of a Christian, and must be attained. Falling back into sin is a gross error within Holiness communities. When a regenerate Christian “backslides” into sin, they must repent, revive themselves, recommit, and often be rebaptized. This is where the revival aspect took root.

Charles Grandison Finney

Finney’s new measures centered upon revival meetings. His theology rejected the songs and liturgy of the church in favor of new musical styles and a different structure. This structure reversed the direction of corporate worship. Christian worship prior to Finney revolved around God’s gifts for His people and our receiving them.

The revivalist style and its substance revolve entirely upon the emotional excitement of the people gathered. Ramping that into a heightened fury is their evidence of the Holy Spirit at work. Apart from these events, the revivalists find no comfort or certainty in their faith, conversion, working of God in their lives, or even their salvation. The moment and surety of the their salvation, as they understand it, has a date and time concurrent with a revival event experience.

Is that a problem?

Yes, it is. Christianity revolves around a God, who promises Himself to us through means, in which He promised to deliver His gifts. In Baptism, God forgives sins and delivers faith. In the hearing of the Word, we receive faith. In the Lord’s Supper, we receive the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation. The absence of our doing in the faith is a feature not a bug. The absence of our emotional proof of God’s work is a feature not a bug.

Revivalism rejects God’s work for us, replacing it with our work. The event earns God’s attention and His favor. The event is all about us and our doing. Our work and our feeling of the event are proof of God. This is the opposite of what the scriptures teach us.

God the Father sent His son Jesus to die for our sin. He delivers this to us extra nos, (outside of our selves). Looking inside, just reveals the sin that remains. Gathering to hear and receive from outside of ourselves in the Lord’s house is His work for us. He’s never been apart from His work for us. He’s always been in exactly the same place for you. There’s certainty here.even

Here is how Martin Luther Describes it:

The third article of the Apostles’ Creed – Sanctification.

I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy Christian Church, the communion of Saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen.

What does this mean?

I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ my Lord or come to him. But the Holy Spirit has called me by the gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith. In the same way He calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies the whole Christian Church on earth and keeps it with Jesus Christ in the one true faith. In this Christian Church He daily and richly forgives all my sins and the sins of all believers. On the last day He will raise up me and all the dead and will give eternal life to me and to all believers in Christ. This is most certainly true. (Luther’s Small Catechism 2:3, emphasis mine)

The Bottom line

The Holy Spirit isn’t in my emotions, which rise and fall, grow and fade. He is at work in His Word and sacraments. He’s in the same places He promised to be. The Holy Spirit was ceaselessly at work in His church for 1800 years before Finney discovered the “real” way and evidence of the Spirit.

Beware of innovators, God doesn’t change.

Rev. Jason M. Kaspar
Sole Pastor
Mt. Calvary Lutheran Church & Preschool La Grange, TX
and
Mission planting pastoral team
Epiphany Lutheran Church
Bastrop, TX

Love

Encore Post: In American culture, love is everywhere. It is a constant theme of movies, TV programs, stories, songs, poetry and even commercials! At Valentine’s Day especially, images of couples planning romantic moments are everywhere. At some point in the dating life of many lovers, men and women obsess over whether they should tell their dates that they love them.

But the English word love is more than that. We love our pets, our favorite food, good weather, our sports teams, our friends, freedom and truth — just about everything. The Greek language of the New Testament uses several words to cover it all. φιλέω (phileo) is the love and affection between friends. ἔρος (Eros) is sexual love that is obsessed with another and is not satisfied until it gets what it wants. ἀγαπάω is a love that sacrifices for the good of the one it loves. (See 1 Corinthians 13) ἀγαπάω is the word the New Testament uses for God’s love and the love God wants us to show to him and our neighbors.

God loved us before he made the world. (Ephesians 1:4-5) He loved us so much that he sacrificed his only Son to save us. (John 3:16-17) Because he first loved us, we love him and want to please him. He commands us to love him and our neighbors. Jesus tells us that the whole of God’s law is to love God and our neighbors as ourselves. (Matthew 22:37-40) In a very real sense, our love is itself God’s gift to us. While our love in this world is not perfect, God’s love for us is perfect. It lasts forever and conquers even death.

Jews and Gentiles

Encore Post: The Greeks saw the world as made up of two kinds of people — Greeks and Barbarians. For the Romans, it was Romans and Pagans. In the 1960s, we saw the world as Americans versus Communists. The Communists saw the world as Communists and Capitalists or Imperialists. For the Jews, it was Jews and Gentiles.

Of course, for them, God was the source of this separation. He called Abraham out from the Sumerian culture and the serving of multiple gods to the service of the one, true God. He set him aside from the rest of the world to be a blessing to it. He grew the nation from the descendants of Abraham and Sarah. He freed them from slavery in Egypt, gave them his law, formed them in the desert and gave them the land of promise.

But there the other nations — the gentiles — worshiped other gods and lived in great immorality.Not the least of that evil was that they would sacrifice their children for favors from their gods. So God commanded the people of Israel to kill them all and destroy all their possessions. The Israelites did not do this perfectly. Those people tempted God’s people to wander from him and sink into their immorality. God punished them with exile in Babylon. With the exception of 150 or so years, they lived as the subjects of pagan nations.

They learned the lesson. The Jews — at least the pious ones — tried to keep the law so perfectly they invented their own laws and traditions. Among those was strict separation from Gentiles, to the point of not even eating with them. In the temple, they would not allow gentiles to enter the temple proper and punished transgression with death.

The celebration of Epiphany marks how the coming of Christ changes this once and for all. Jesus died on the cross for the sins of both Jew and gentiles. The reason for the division is destroyed, demonstrated when the temple curtain tore in two from top to bottom. Now as Isaiah prophesied, the nations come to God through Christ and meet God’s people there. Together we praise him who called us both out of darkness into to his marvelous light.

Sunday School The Good Samaritan

Encore Post: Three thousand years ago, ten tribes of Israel broke away from King Solomon’s son and formed a new kingdom north of Jerusalem. The kings of the northern tribes built a capital, called Samaria about forty miles north of Jerusalem. When the Assyrian Empire conquered the northern kingdom, they deported many of the Israelites and resettled people from far away places. The Samaritan people were born when Israelites married their captors. The Jewish people considered them as traitors and hated them. The Samaritans hated them in return, especially when Jewish armies destroyed their temple and their city. At the time of Jesus, Jews wanted nothing to do with them. They would avoid even traveling through Samaria, even to go to Jerusalem. The worst thing one Jew could call another was a Samaritan.

One day, an expert in God’s law asked Jesus a traditional question posed to Rabbis: which is the greatest of all commandments? Jesus turned the question around to him. The expert replied with the commandments to love God and to love neighbor as yourself. Jesus agreed and told him to do these and he would inherit eternal life. So, the expert asked Jesus who is our neighbor. Jesus’ answer was the story we call the parable of the Good Samaritan. (Luke 10:25-37)

In this story, the two kinds of people you would expect would help you were priests and Levites. They led worship in the temple, where God showed His love for His people by forgiving their sins. They did not want to become unclean by touching a dead person. So they did not help the injured man. But the Samaritan felt very sorry for him, cared for him and paid a lot of money to see that he was cared for until the day he recovered.

Jesus asked the expert which of these three was a neighbor to the injured man. He answered, “The one who showed mercy.” Jesus told him to do the same. As sinners, we will fail to do this perfectly. Yet as Christians, the church responds to the love of God in Christ, has reached out in mercy to those who suffer with countless needs over two thousand years. We remember that Jesus responded to our greatest need by suffering and dying that we might be saved and inherit eternal life. With the help of the Holy Spirit, we reach out to care for those who need us the most to show them the mercy God showed us.

Blog Post Series

The Stronger Man Has Come and Welcomes You Home

Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

Adam and Eve were in great shape. They had been blessed by the Lord, commanded to have dominion over the earth, to be fruitful and multiply. They were living a good life in the garden, the home prepared for them by the Lord their God. But it wasn’t very long before the serpent came tempting. Eve was simply outmatched; the serpent was stronger than Eve who tried to put somewhat of a defense. Adam on the other hand was less than impressive not saying a single word against the assault of the serpent upon Eve. He was there the entire time at her side, but Adam, who should have been protecting Eve from the serpent, did nothing. Adam failed his wife that day. With their fall, no longer listening to and doing the will of God, they were cast out of the house and family of God. Adam and Eve were strong but the serpent was stronger, and so he bound them and took them as his bounty. He took them into his house of death.

Adam and Eve were now slaves in a strong man’s house. Stuck in sin, slaves to it and their passions, they and their children would meet their eternal deaths. They would be under the burden of their sin, and would face the temporal consequences. The earth would no longer give up its bountiful harvests. Children would not come easily for husband and wife, and if they were to have one or two, rearing children would be its own difficult task. And wife’s desire would be to supplant husband as head of household, and man would then seek to rule over her, neither of which lead to a happy and successful marriage. Rather, strife ensues. Stuck in the strong man’s house, the house of the serpent, to whom they had hooked their wagons when taking the fruit, desiring to be wise, they now were being led to eternal death.

You are the sons of Adam and daughters of Eve. Do you do your own will? Or do you listen to and do God’s will? Do you know His Will? The strong man, Satan, makes you wonder just like he made Eve. And we without the calling of the Holy Spirit in Gospel are bound to believe Satan. Is God’s will actually good for me? He would also lie and say no.

But yet, what if I told you, God’s will is right under your nose, and that it is really good for you? If you answered you did not know God’s will, you are welcome to open your bible and read. Our Lord’s will is made known to you, because God’s Word is His will. It is plain and simple right in front of you. He had given Adam and Eve His will by speaking to them the words concerning this tree. “Let us make man in our image” the Lord said. Creating Adam and Eve and every single of you was His Will. “You shall not eat of the tree in the middle of the garden, for the moment you do, you shall surely die.” More of God’s will was made known to Adam and Eve. Every tree is given you for food, except for the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. That was God’s will.

After our mother and father fell – and plunging all of humanity with them into the depths of death and sin – God’s will is for redemption to take place. He does not utterly destroy His creation in those tense moments after the first sin, but He shows His intense love for it. He makes the promise to save Adam and Eve and all their children who would follow in their sinful ways. Our Lord’s love for His creation never changes. The Lord would save it via the seed of the woman.

Now a woman does not have a seed. She has an egg. This is no ordinary child promised to be born of the woman. He can’t be born the natural way otherwise he would carry the sin of Adam and Eve. But God the Holy Spirit would overshadow Mary and she would give birth to Jesus the very Son of God, and He would live, fight and die for our redemption against the strong man, Satan. For when He looks at us, He sees his mother, sisters, and brothers. Jesus, our Lord came into the world, the devil’s playground, or as others call it, enemy occupied territory, to take for Himself that which was His from the beginning. He, the stronger man, came to bind the strong man, Satan, that He might have His inheritance. His inheritance is you and all the faithful of God. It is you in whom our Lord Jesus Christ delights. And He delighted in you from the moment of creation and even after the fall. His delight in us is made known to us in and through our Lord’s incarnation, life, and ultimately his death on the cross. He did the will of His Father that you might be welcomed back into the family and household of God for the sake of Christ who died and rose for you.

You then, are no longer a slave in the house of Satan; death has no dominion over you because your Lord Jesus has come and has bound Satan by defeating Him at the cross. Death had no hold on Him, and because you have been brought to the waters of Holy Baptism and have been washed in the Water and Word, you belong to the Lord Jesus Christ. He, who bound himself to our flesh by His incarnation, now binds you to Himself in the waters of Holy Baptism forever. Rejoice and be glad for He has redeemed you. You are made new and the new man stands and lives before God, ready to do His will, joyfully hearing His Word and trusting in it for everlasting life.

We are led to believe that God’s will for us is something that is extremely personal. I have heard many a prayer asking for God to show His will for a certain person’s life. A question might be posed this way: What is God’s will for me in this life? Maybe it is a prayer in the imperative command, “Lord, show me your will!” We might think we don’t know it, but its most likely we have failed to pay attention to His Word, which is His Will. They are one and the same. The will of your Father in heaven is for you listen to the words of His Son and believe Him that you might be saved from everlasting death and hell. That is God’s will for you and all humanity. Christ says, “Truly, I say to you, all sins will be forgiven the children of man, and whatever blasphemies they utter, but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin.” Ultimately it comes down to the first commandment, do you believe in the God who says, “You shall have no other gods before me” or do you not? Do you believe the words of the Incarnate Son of God, who in His pre-incarnate state spoke the Ten commandments to Moses on Mount Sinai, or do you not? Are you going to trust in what Jesus says or are you going to put your trust and your hope in something else?

To whose house do you belong? The house of death? Or the house of life? “Whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother.” These words should make us at least look at our lives and ask if we are really doing God’s will. Are we listening to His Word and believing it as He has spoken? Have we tried to lessen some of the burdens of God’s Word because we don’t like what it says because it may be hard to hear and pierces the heart? When we try to form God or Jesus into something other than what He has said about Himself in His Word we are creating an idol, who is really not God at all.

Repent, and confess your sins and believe in the one who has redeemed you and forgives your sins against God’s will, Jesus Christ. That is is the will of God the Father, for your to believe in His Son and be raised to everlasting life on the last day.

While we wait for that day, we live here and now. Strive in this life to do better in keeping your Lord’s Word front and center in your lives. Fight against your sinful and lazy flesh. Do not roll over on your pillow and attend St. Snooze away on Sunday mornings. Go to your pastor’s bible studies, be in God’s Word so that God’s Word is active in your life, come to the rail and receive all of Christ’s gracious gifts for you. Do not put your faith in a box only to be opened on Sunday mornings, but rather what you hear on Sunday mornings concerning your Lord Jesus and what He has done for you by his death and resurrection should affect every aspect of your life.

Do not just shrug your shoulders when you get the urge to write a note of encouragement to a friend. Do not lie to your mom about having cleaned your room, but rather do the job in the manner she desires and expects. Parents, do not sit idly by when you see your children doing something that will undoubtedly create lasting damage to their faith. In other words, fight against the one who tempts you, for the One who lives in you by Holy Baptism is stronger than the tempter. Confess your sins, but also confess your faith in the stronger man Jesus, who came to die that you might be saved from the house of death. And you now, being bound to Christ by Holy Baptism, have the victory over Satan. Just as Jesus crushed the head of the serpent, so you now are able to tread upon Him because of being bound to Christ. The stronger man has come and bound him who had you bound. You are free. And you’re made a child of household of God. Do not forget whose family you now belong. Trust in our Lord’s abundant promises. Sins are forgiven because of Christ’s bitter sufferings and death in your place at the cross.

You have the same spirit of faith within you as did St. Paul. We then with him should believe and thus speak. We should be speaking this good news that Jesus has bound the strong man, Satan, that all the world might live in peace before our Lord and God forever doing His Will. Things do not look all that good if you look around the world, our own bodies are showing their wear and tear, yet we have the promise to which we have been called, a promise which God our Lord has called all people to believe. And He who has redeemed us now comes to us with His mercy and grace, bestowing to us His body and blood as a pledge and token of the marriage feast that has no end. And He says to you, welcome home my children. Welcome home.

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Rev. Jacob Hercamp
St. Peter’s Lutheran Church
La Grange, MO

Adopted as Sons

Encore Post: A child is born in ancient Rome. The baby is carefully cleaned and tenderly wrapped. She is brought to the father of the family (pater familias) and set at his feet. The household watches to see what the father will do. If he picks up the child and says, “this is my son,” the baby will be an heir in the family, even if the mother is a slave. If he turns and walks a way, the child will be set outside in the street, exposed to the fates and not a part of the family. By this and similar legal proceedings, a free Roman could adopt anyone he wishes and grant all the rights and privileges due to his children to that person. In Greek, the word is υἱοθεσία (huiothesia, the placing as a son, the adoption as a son)

Because he loves us, God arranged for us to be adopted as his sons (Ephesians 1:4-5). At just the right time, the Father sent his Son, to be born of the Virgin Mary, to redeem us by his sinless life, suffering, death on the cross and resurrection, so that we might be adopted as his sons in our baptism. He then sent his Holy Spirit into our hearts, so that now we can call him “Abba” — “Daddy.” (Galatians 4:4-7) The Holy Spirit testified to all of this. Now, since we are God’s heirs — heirs with Christ, we share in his sufferings in order to share in his glory. (Romans 8:15-17) We await the final adoption decree, the resurrection of our bodies at the end of time. (Romans 8:23)

The Law of God is Good and Wise

Encore Post: The natural world often calls to us with beautiful sunrises and sunsets, filled with colors that contrast with snow during the winter, complement in spring and summer the green of forests and fields and the green-blue of lakes and oceans, and that complete the wide range of colors in northern mountains, clothed with fall foliage. Even in our world damaged by the fall, there is order, symmetry and rhythm. All of these things are ordered by our Creator with unseen and often unknown principles — laws — that provide for us a place to call home and allow us to plan our lives in it.

The law of God is knowledge of God’s will and the way he wants his children to live. When God formed Adam from the dust of the earth, God built into him was the law of God, written into his heart. Adam loved God, wanted to serve him and knew what pleased the Father. When God formed Eve, this knowledge of God’s law passed down to her as well. Only a few of God’s commandments were spoken to him: be fruitful and multiply, rule over the living things on the Earth and eat plants (Genesis 1:29-30), work in and keep the Garden of Eden and do not eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and of Evil. (Genesis 2:15-17)

When Adam and Eve disobeyed God and brought sin into the world, the image of God within them was destroyed. Some knowledge of his law remains written in our hearts, but it is very distorted, so that, ironically, we no longer know good from evil. When God in his love and mercy promised that the Messiah would come one day to crush the head of Satan, (Genesis 3:15) he began to reveal his law, giving it in detail to Moses. It now serves three purposes, which we will take up in another post.

To:Child and Pupil of the Catechism

The Faith of Children

Encore Post: Evangelicals reject infant baptism is they think faith is all about understanding and agreeing to a series of teachings about God, Jesus in particular, and how we are saved. Since infants and young children have little ability to understand things intellectually. For Lutherans and the Holy Scriptures, faith is not an exercise of our reason, but a trust in God’s promises.

The problem with understanding faith this way is that even adults do not always have an ability to think, and, when they do, may still reject the Gospel. Lutheran theologians point out that we do not think when we sleep or in a coma. Sometimes disease can take from us our mind in old age or brain trauma. Yet such adults are not considered by anyone to have lost their faith.

On the contrary, Jesus and the Apostles tell us children do have faith. In fact, Jesus praises their ability to trust God. (Matthew 18:2-6, Mark 10:13-16) John the Baptist and Timothy believed in the womb (Luke 1:41-44, 2 Timothy 3:15) So, faith is all about trusting in God to save us and children are the most trusting of all people. Jesus does not urge children to become more like adults when it comes to faith. He urges adults to become more like children.

Children are Sinners, Too

Encore Posts: On the surface, we might think that the Evangelical challenge to infant baptism is about the practice itself. If the objection was that simple, perhaps there would be much less passion in the debate.

I believe the real issues are deeper than that. For Lutherans, the emotion behind our defense of the baptism of infants comes from the assurance that our children are saved by baptism. For Evangelicals, the objection comes from their belief that children are not accountable for their sins until they can ask Jesus to be their personal savior and because they believe baptism is a human act of obedience. In short, they do not believe in original sin.

Original sin is the name theologians give to the teaching of Holy Scripture that all people are born as sinners and that that state is inherited from Adam and Eve, resulting from their first sin in Eden. The big problem that we have is less that we commit sins, than that we are conceived sinful. (Psalm 51:5)

Everyone, including children, are accountable to God for who they are and the sins they commit from the very beginning of their lives. (Romans 3:10-19) Every thought we have inclines to evil (Genesis 6:5, Genesis 8:21). These thoughts are the cause of all the sins we commit. (Matthew 15:17-20) Only by being born of water and the Spirit can we see God’s kingdom. That is why we baptize infants and children.

Everybody’s Good at Heart? Right?

Encore Post: “He meant well,” you explain when someone you love really makes a mess of things. He may have tried to do something good, but his actions just complicated an already bad situation. You may have defended your actions with similar words. “I was just trying to help,” you say. Sometimes we can convince others not to blame us or our friends when our actions end up hurting others. This kind of argument often works because we all would like to believe that people are good at heart. No one really wants to hurt others, we think. There must be a reason why someone does even evil things. Maybe they are poorly educated or have been harmed by others or grew up in a violent neighborhood. deep down we like to think of ourselves as good people.

Unfortunately, this is more fantasy than reality. From time to time, mass murderers or other criminals show this to us by committing horrible crimes, even though they grew up with every advantage in life. We study their lives, but we cannot find even a motive for their evil.

And even so, they are not alone. We also were born as sinners. (Psalm 51:5) Our hearts and minds were filled with evil thoughts. (Genesis 6:5, Genesis 8:21 , Mark 7:2-23 ). We were dead spiritually, caught up in the ways of this world, controlled by Satan. Down deep, we really didn’t even want God to save us. (Ephesians 2:1-3, Romans 3:9-18) We spent our lives, like the rest of the world, chasing whatever makes us feel good and entertains us. What we really deserve is God’s punishment and nothing we can do will change that.

Yes, we were spiritually dead, filled with sin. Yet God loved us anyway. So He sent His son to die in our place. On the cross, Jesus paid the full price for our salvation. So, our sins are forgiven, our guilt removed and the power that the world, the devil our flesh has over us was broken once and for all time.

Now, together with Jesus, he raised us from the dead, spiritually now, but literally on the last day. He did this, so where Jesus is, we will be also. All of this is because of his grace alone.