Jesus Christ is the Ark of the New Covenant. He is our place of atonement, our mercy seat. He puts a lid on the righteousness that might otherwise condemn us by offering his very self in our stead on the cross.
Because the biblical story unfolds in real places among real people, archaeology helps us understand the world in which God's saving work took place and, in turn, enriches our reading of Scripture.
The Reformers did not return to the sources because they believed the old was better than the new, nor because antiquity possesses authority simply by virtue of its age. They returned to the sources to recover the language and words that were actually written and spoken, especially those by great teachers and, most importantly, God Himself.

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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.
Rightly distinguishing between law and gospel, as Paul helps us see in 2 Corinthians 3, is, quite literally, a matter of life and death.
Christ our Word, as with a two-edged sword, burst the devil's belly.
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.
All of Scripture, every last syllable of it, is meant to drive us to "consider Jesus," the One who comes to "make us right" by gifting us his righteousness.
This is an excerpt from “The Alien and the Proper: Luther's Two-Fold Righteousness in Controversy, Ministry, and Citizenship,” edited by Robert Kolb (1517 Publishing, 2023). Now available for purchase.
Jesus not only healed her daughter, but he also gave himself to her. Wherever she went from then on, he was with her.
This is an excerpt from “The Alien and the Proper: Luther's Two-Fold Righteousness in Controversy, Ministry, and Citizenship,” edited by Robert Kolb (1517 Publishing, 2023).
God gives us the power and authority to proclaim the forgiveness of sins to burdened sinners who entrust us with their pain, guilt, and defeat.
The law had to have its way with the expert to bring him around (and back) to Abraham's response.
In Memory of My Friend, James Arne Nestingen