A blog of the Evangelical Lutheran Liturgy
Our aim with all sinners, including those struggling with depression and suicidal thoughts, is to point them to the hope we have in Christ, and the encouragement that He never leaves us as we fight the good fight of faith – a fight we should never give up.
Read MoreMy death thus vanishes in His life, my sins in His righteousness, and my condemnation in His salvation. Here my sin is forced between the hammer and the anvil, so that it perishes and vanishes. For now since my sin, my filth is taken away, He must adorn me and clothe me with His eternal righteousness and with all His grace until I become beautiful; for I am His Bride.
Read MoreThe chief article of our doctrine must come to our help, namely, that our Lord Jesus Christ, who was sent into the world by the Father, suffered and died for us and thereby reconciled and moved the Father to grace, and now sits at the right hand of the Father, pleading our cause as our Savior and as our constant Mediator and Intercessor interceding for us who can not of ourselves have or obtain this perfect purity and good conscience. Therefore through Him we can say before God: Although I am not pure and cannot have a good conscience, yet I cleave to Him who possesses perfect purity and good conscience and offers them for me, indeed, gives them to me.
Read MoreGod wants weddings to be regarded with honor, in order to attract young people to an honorable marriage in contrast with pollutions of every kind and with promiscuity. Therefore He praises this moderate and honorable display and wanted it recorded. In the eyes of the monks it appears to be luxury. But it was His purpose to bear witness that the finery, the banquets, and the merriment connected with the wedding meet with His approval because of the final cause of marriage, which is the begetting and upbringing of children and the governing of the household, the state, and the church.
Read MoreThe example of Sarah is the rhetoric, as it were, which draws, arouses, and persuades us to despise death; but the Sacrament brings about and works in my body what was brought about in Abraham and many saints who were raised from the dead. Therefore examples should not be scorned, since the rhetoric they employ is pleasant; but because the example of Christ is at the same time a Sacrament, it is efficacious in us and not only teaches us, as do the examples of the fathers, but accomplishes what it teaches. It gives life, the resurrection, and deliverance from death.
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