Auden understands Luther’s doctrine of justification by faith not as a mere theological platitude, a trick of biblical grammar, or a catchphrase for men to rally around.
Our Lord Jesus builds, forms, and fashions his church as an artist forms a mosaic.
Luther felt the reform of the church could not simply remain a matter of aesthetics and practice. Something much deeper needed to be rooted out.

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People say only two things in life are certain: death and taxes. But there are other certainties. Like the daily rising and setting of the sun. And like the fact that life itself has its risings and settings as well.
The Lord is your Shepherd, your Good Shepherd. And all He wants is you.
We do not, as followers of Jesus, put any hope or place any trust in “princes, in mortal man, in whom there is no salvation” (Ps. 146:3).
Some of the last words our Lord spoke were addressed to a man who stood on the precipice of eternity.
Infamy allows us the opportunity to hone one of our favorite skills: to shrink a 343-page life story down to a single paragraph that narrates what happened on one day, at a certain hour, and in a certain location. We can whittle an entire biography down to a single Tweet.
There is no perfect, divinely chosen, just-waiting-for-you-to-figure-it-out job for you. The Lord will use you to serve others in whatever vocation you choose. You’re not only his child but his priest. So, wherever you work, there is your altar.
Jesus didn’t simply vacate the tomb to end death. He brought up from that grave the seeds of a brand new start at life. Genesis 1 all over again, with no chance of Genesis 3.
When Lamech named his newborn son Noah—which means “rest”—he said, “This one shall give us comfort from our work and from the toil of our hands arising from the ground which the Lord has cursed”
Since God is most high, He can only look down. Nothing is above Him. No one is more exalted than He is.
The prophets of old were right: we do resemble what we revere. Our anthropology is hijacked by materialism. We become just stuff who consume stuff and hope to have enough stuff to make life worth it.
One of my jobs in high school was helping local ranchers work cattle. We’d vaccinate, cut off horns, castrate, mark their ears, and brand them.
Pastors are built from the same stuff as everyone else. That’s good, and that’s bad.