One great thing about our post-denominational age is that it has opened up opportunities to make common cause with other Lutherans who, despite their differences and eccentricities, can agree on some of the most important things.
Pride builds identities that leave no room for grace.
We can willingly admit the fact that we're just like tax collectors and thieves.

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Pastor Craft: Essays and Sermons is now available through 1517 Publishing
Your Christian faith is a bloody faith, and that ought not make you fearful or scared or embarrassed.
The creation of this word reminds us that the Magnificat, like Christmas itself, is charged from the start with joy and praise.
Big or small, potential or certain, the despair we may grapple with during this time of year tends to find its end in the fact that things are not as they should be.
This is an excerpt from Chapter 27 in “Pastor Craft: Essays and Sermons” written by John T. Pless (1517 Publishing, 2021). Now Available for Preorder
Preparing for Advent? Discover Seven Ways to Better Know the Christ of Christmas in this free guide.
The thought of losing even one of those for whom his Son died pains God beyond belief, and the angels rejoice when even one of his children repents.
Sometimes it is the unnamed characters in the Bible who can most help present-day readers find their own place in the biblical story.
Each week during this year’s Advent series, we will take a look at a specific implication of Christ’s incarnation. This week, we will discover how God reaffirms the goodness of his creation by making all things new in the incarnation.
Like Isaiah and John, we look forward to that great and glorious day, trusting the resurrected One will return as He promised.
In Genesis 1-2, the Lord reveals—or, at a bare minimum, starts dropping some big hints—that he will be quite comfortable becoming a human being himself someday.
The oddness of this moment, at the beginning of Advent, is God’s way of saying, “The reason I’m here...”