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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Jeremiah is saying, “LORD I am doing my job, why are You NOT doing Yours?”
Even as children of God, we have down days. That’s just a fact of being sinful and living in an evil world.
Isaiah first reminds the people of who they are and then tells them why they are who they are; to bring the teachings and promises of the LORD to all people.
Only when we stand where God has located Himself for us do we find an imperishable promise.
Jesus is our confidence because he reveals truth from falsehood, right from wrong, and reality from appearance, so that we may rely on him for our every need of body, soul, and mind.
The scandal of this text for the Jewish people is the inclusion of all nations and peoples into the Holy House of the LORD.
Miracles, for all their wonder and encouragement, rely on the dazzling of our senses to work. Because miracle-faith produces sensory-faith, it is of a poor quality.
It is important to see how the LORD does NOT answer the questions Job and his friends have been wrestling with.
In Christ Jesus, through faith, we’ve received everything we need for our bodies and lives, and life eternal.
This food, already purchased and freely given in our pericope, is a foretaste of the feast to come as well; the marriage feast of the Lamb in His Kingdom which has no end.
The well-known Sunday School story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego is far from a simple account of three brave and faithful Israelites. It’s a mini-story with a mega-story tucked inside it—a story that links it (backward) to Exodus and (forward) to the Gospels.
To dwell with a Holy God in their camp, Israel lead holy lives. Anything standing in the way of and threatening this holy relationship must be avoided or eliminated.