The only hope for idol-addicted sinners who are utterly incapable of decluttering their souls is Jesus, the one at the heart of the gospel, and the only one who stands before the Father with an undivided heart.
More than a friend, Amsdorf was also an important figure in the work of religious reform, providing counsel to Luther on key occasions, shepherding the churches, and defending the faith until his death.
Just as it is necessary that Christ took on flesh for our salvation, so too, it is necessary that he should be in the supper bodily

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The Word of Yahweh is not a trifling thing that can be visited only when it’s convenient. It’s a book of life, for all of life, that imparts life to those who believe in it and the God of it.
We won’t use the right words, but the Holy Spirit is interceding with and for us, as we pray.
Fourteen years ago, drowning in the muck of dark despair, in the middle of a life gone terribly wrong, I wrote in my journal, "I wonder how, once this is all over, how I’ll be, how I’ll turn out…” Now I know.
Without the sacraments, God’s grace is simply an artifact behind a glass-case in a museum. We might be able to describe and even admire it, but we never get firsthand access to it.
A Sermon on Psalm 130:3–6.
Our experience with good fathers – even when they are not our own – can point us to God the Father.
Grace and mercy are a powerful act of the Almighty God. God alone can grant forgiveness and restoration, salvation from the sorrow of this world.
While the insights in each chapter are uniquely personal to the individual writers, the overarching theme is one of the sufficiency of Christ.
Forty-five seconds is about how long I have as a pastor leading a Sunday morning service to sit at the feet of the cross and receive Jesus’ body and blood given to me by the hands of another at the Lord’s Table.
Wilson reminds his reader over and over again that, in his love, God accepts sinners as they are so that we may be delivered from the self-acceptance, self-worship, and self-justification of our selfish definitions of love.
Christ has taken our failures and defeats and exchanges that yoke for his own.
Grace does not emancipate us from any requirement of obedience. Rather, grace allows Jesus to be obedient on our behalf that the righteous demands of the law can be fulfilled.