God can handle grief, rage, and cries for justice. God can handle the victim who cannot yet forgive. God can handle the prayer that comes out jagged and wounded. The good news is that God is holy and merciful enough to handle all our prayers.
But while scholars are right to focus on the bond between Martin and Hans, the evidence of Martin’s own words suggests their relationship may not have been as troubled as some suppose. For Hans Luther was not a cartoon villain but a normal human being attempting to make his way in the world and raise his children to the best of his ability.
Jesus offers something infinitely better. He tells us to put down our gavel—not because sin isn't real, but because the only Judge who has the right to condemn is the very One who was condemned for us.

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But it is not always helpful to create tidy categories of good and bad and to say, “Stop being ‘a Martha’ and do a better job of being ‘a Mary.’” That is a dangerous sermon to preach. In doing so, we can fall into the very thing we see Martha doing.
The parable of the Good Samaritan is both a call to faith in Jesus and a call to love our neighbor.
The world hates Jesus because he comes to lead us to love and forgive all, including our enemies.
Despite the very real obstacles and difficulties, this entire scene is marked by God’s gracious work.
FLAME uses Scripture and church history to argue that baptism is a gospel gift, not our work.
Nuance and subtlety have been replaced with scorched-earth contempt. It is us versus them. Compromise is not an option. Jesus, however, would have none of it.
This week, we are grateful to publish a series of sermons from our beloved late Chaplain, Ron Hodel. This is the fifth installment of that series.
God has a plan for this world that he put into place from eternity, a plan that is carried out in Jesus Christ and promises unimaginably great blessings for believers.
Jesus comes to people and changes everything. “Before” is long gone. “After” is a whole new world.
For Japan’s highly secularized elite, alienated by collapsing opportunity and the materialistic void left behind, Bach’s music was a balm.
As astounding as co-eternity and co-equality with the Father in majesty and glory is, this is not the most significant answer Jesus gave in this Gospel reading, not for us at least.
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