When Religion Becomes Obsolete, Christ Does Not

By Russ Lackey | Mark Mattes

01/20/26

19mins

When Religion Becomes Obsolete, Christ Does Not

American religion did not become optional because the gospel failed. It became optional because religion slowly redefined itself around usefulness.

Bradley Gray

01/19/26

Behold the Lamb

The Passover wasn’t just Israel’s story; it’s ours.

Psalm 12, Part 2: The Saint Fails, The Word Purifies

Steven Paulson

01/16/26

Psalm 12, Part 2: The Saint Fails, The Word Purifies

God makes us pure saints by planting us back in the earth we imagined we needed to escape.

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John Bombaro

01/29/23

Epistle: 1 Corinthians 1:18-31 (Epiphany 4: Series A)

Christianity is not principally about ethics. It was the Cross on the Hill rather than the Sermon on the Mount which produced the impact of Christianity upon the world.

Dan Weber

01/29/23

Gospel: Matthew 5:1-12 (Epiphany 4: Series A)

I hope your people expect and even demand this of you. But how we proclaim the central message, that can (and probably should) vary.

John Bombaro

01/29/23

Authentic Proclamation: How Good Pastoring Factors into Good Preaching

Authentic proclamation, then, is the love of Christ for our souls, which we have seen and experienced through the under-shepherd’s pastoral care put into the words of Christ Himself.

Bruce Hillman

01/27/23

I Don't Want Eternal Life, It's Too Long

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.

Bradley Gray

01/25/23

Consider Jesus

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.

Robert Kolb

01/24/23

God and His Human Creatures in Luther’s Sermons on Genesis

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.

Donavon Riley

01/23/23

And From That Very Hour, You Are Healed

Jesus not only healed her daughter, but he also gave himself to her. Wherever she went from then on, he was with her.

John Bombaro

01/19/23

True Tolerance

We assert, we herald, the truth about God becoming King of the world in and through Jesus of Nazareth alone. It is our public announcement.

Dan Weber

01/14/23

Gospel: Matthew 4:12-25 (Epiphany 3: Series A)

Though it may feel to us like the darkness is winning, God’s Word reveals the darkness is waning. The Light of the world has come.

John Bombaro

01/14/23

Epistle: 1 Corinthians 1:10-18 (Epiphany 3: Series A)

The Church becomes anti-church when the new world order Christ inaugurated by eliminating demographic division through the commonality of Baptism is exploded by allegiance to cults of personality.

John Bombaro

01/13/23

Very Superstitious: A History of the Sign of the Cross

The sign of the cross, according to the earliest centuries of Christians, is “the sign of the Lord,” and every baptized Christian was “marked” with it.

Haroldo Camacho

01/10/23

Another Look at the "Loving" Expert on the Law

The law had to have its way with the expert to bring him around (and back) to Abraham's response.

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