Luther neither removed the Apocrypha from the Bible nor discouraged its use. Rather, he received and preserved the ancient distinction inherited from the fathers: the Apocrypha is valuable, edifying, and worthy of reading, but it is not Holy Scripture and therefore cannot serve as the foundation of Christian doctrine.
The confessors at Augsburg remind us that every generation of Christians is called to bear witness to the gospel amid the challenges and pressures of its own age. As they confessed Christ before emperors and kingdoms, so the Church continues to confess Him before the world today.
When Jesus washes you with baptismal water, you can rest assured that the Lion of Judah is on the move.

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When I finished this book, I loved the Bible, and the Bible’s author, even more. And I can’t imagine a better endorsement than that.
There is a revival, no less real and even more definitive, taking place in every church, every weekend, where God’s people gather around his gifts.
To believe God is love and thus loves you is a miracle wrought by the Holy Spirit.
His love for you is so deep that in his mercy, while you were yet a sinner, God sent his only begotten Son to die for you.
“So loved,” then isn’t about how much but instead simply how.
Zephaniah has given us something more visceral to help us understand the love of God: the sound of salvation.
This week we will take a closer look at God's love in Scripture.
This sermon was originally given at Luther Seminary chapel on May 20, 1986.
We too are God’s baptized, beloved, blood-bought believers. And no one can ever take that away from us.
Love is pointing to Jesus who said, “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).
I think the problem with the idea of eternity is that we do not have any direct experience of it, but we encounter enough of its possibility to be unsettling.
The king has arrived and has already begun his reign forever and ever.