RoboPreacher

what a spell we're all pinned under A reading from 1 Kings; chapter 12, verses 1-17 and 25-29 : A central tenet of the reformation is “ simul justus et peccator .” That’s latin for, “ simultaneously saint and sinner.”   What this nifty little phrase means is that to be a human is to be both a sinners and a saint! At the same time. All of the time! That rings true to life. Doesn’t it? I know it does for me . And not in some theoretical way, either. But in a real life kind of way. Daily I experience the tug of war of being caught between sinner and saint. Of wanting to do the right thing, and failing to. And, of experiencing the disorienting encounter of having done the right thing, but NOT when I were trying to! …We are, if nothing else, a confusing mixture of good and evil… And this description is one you can see playing itself out over and over again.   Not least of all, in scripture … Today’s scripture begins with King Reh...

he meant an entire life of repentance... Reformation 500 has come and gone… For years we’ve been talking about how big of a deal this is. But as the big day approached, it became more and more clear, "business as usual” was directing our affairs. Practical as that may be, what Martin Luther set off 500 years ago interrupted “business as usual.” In fact, folks who were sympathetic to his reforms, suggested Luther back off a little because they were disrupting “business as usual” too much! When did we as a church become more committed to “business as usual,” than the Gospel?   And, don’t think I’m trying to soak the ELCA here, I include myself in this … (Quickly, I think the ornaments were a cool exception to what I’m thinking about) Yes, the “to-do” list never ends anymore. Plenty of usual business calls for our attention. But I can’t help but wonder, how many of these “to-do’s,” really need to be done? What things do we do as the church, just bec...

is our God We’re all a bunch of sinners free-riding on Jesus This month we are going to celebrate something that happened 500 years ago ; the day Martin Luther posted his 95 Thesis in Wittenberg and mailed them to his archbishop. The thesis concern the church practices of Luther’s day. Particularly the practice of buying and selling indulgences. Indulgences we’re a church authorized document, sponsoring the forgiveness of sins of loved ones who had died.   Let me lift up a couple of often overlooked facts about this document’s history. For one thing, it’s scholarly . Luther wrote it in Latin, the language of church professionals.   For another, it wasn’t even Luther who broadcasted these thesis! Others who were sympathetic to the cause of reforming the church, saw the potential of Luther’s letter. So they translated and spread it throughout Europe. In other words, there’s no way Luther could have imagined the impact of these 95 thesis when he was writing the...