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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Except for the Augsburg Confession, Melanchthon’s Loci communes of 1521 were the most important of his writings.
The grass withered for them too, but they held on to God’s Word. They knew that was eternal, so they lived in it. They lived in his forgiveness.
The night has passed and the day broken. In response to the morning dawn, birds sing, beasts arouse themselves and all humanity arises.
As the body positivity movement has gained traction, we must also be aware of some of its pitfalls
Baptism is always valid because no unrighteousness or faithlessness on our part could ify God’s faithfulness.
It isn’t that God struggles to believe our repeated cries of “wolf.” Rather, we struggle to believe God when he repeatedly comes to us with forgiveness and mercy on his lips.
Jesus did not need a single act of mercy to get him started on the road to mercy, his essence was by nature merciful.
Blessed are we, for we are filled by the cornucopia of Christ’s righteousness.
Christ strikes a blow first against the presumption of those who would storm their way into heaven by their good works.
Mankind’s “thoughts and ways” on the matter of pardon and forgiveness do not even come close to exhausting, let alone fathoming, God’s “thoughts and ways.”
God invites you to confess the skeletons in your closet so that he might bury them in the grave for good.
This article comes to us from 1517 guest contributor, Karen Stenberg.