Protestants, in my view, don’t suffer from a Goldilocks problem. They have an arrogance problem.
We need redemption, and we receive it in our church community through God’s Word.
Oliver was a friend, chaplain, professor, author, and loyal church reformer. This Gnesio-Lutheran giant will be missed.

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Yes, He knows all—not only the sins you remember and are ashamed of, but also those you have forgotten and even those you never knew you committed.
In accordance with their views of what a church is, or what a church ought to be, they planned and executed each of these sanctuaries. In other words, theology designed architecture, and architecture signaled theology.
For out of the mouths of these opposition forces, gathered on enemy turf, comes the defiant declaration of death’s undoing: “Christ is risen! He is risen, indeed!” An audacious act it is, to march smack dab into the middle of a place that screams, “Dead!” and to sing, “Alive!”
Here is the truth: we have gained more in Jesus than we lost in Adam. We lost human perfection in the first man's fall. We gained perfect flesh-and-blood unity with God in his Son's incarnation.
When the angel told Mary she had become a mother, she replied simply, ''Let it be to me according to your word.'' Therein is a grateful acknowledgment that the Creator had formed life in her womb.
I don’t need to watch a blood-soaked story on CNN or visit someone of death row to familiarize myself with the beast of depravity crouched within the human heart. I just need to look in the mirror, to stare deeply into the eyes that are a window to a soul that has journeyed down dark paths whose only illumination comes from the fires of hell.
Like me, like most Americans, the equation of wealth with happiness is so firmly rooted in her psyche that only a divine surgeon could dig it out.
She against whom I preached, in her unexpected response actually “preached” to me three truths I have never forgotten.
The Spirit, who endowed the tabernacle architects with wisdom from on high, overshadows Mary's womb, the new holy of holies, where Wisdom is incarnate below.
Though the theophanic elements at the Jerusalem Pentecost were not as diverse as those at Sinai, there is one prominent commonality between the two: divine speech out of divine fire.
We need not look the part to elicit divine compassion. We need not be on our knees, face downcast, eyes watery, voice quivering, to make sure we get heaven’s attention. We need not play the beggar before God.
Let him feel the heft of stone cradled in his palm, and consider the gravity of guilt cast upon the hypocrite.