Luther felt the reform of the church could not simply remain a matter of aesthetics and practice. Something much deeper needed to be rooted out.
While God can, and often does, appear to people face to face, he also often employs the use of several types of messengers.
The “further up and further in” we go, the table keeps getting bigger, the guest list keeps getting longer, and the grace keeps on flowing.

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Martin Luther knew something about economics. Well, God’s economics anyway.
No matter what happens, whether failure, pain, or discouragement, Jesus says, “Come to me... and I will give you rest"
Our enoughness before God cannot be earned by our piety or bestowed by our neighbor. Our righteousness and our justification come from Christ and His work for us
This quest to justify my existence can end because I have been justified by God who gave up heaven to be with me!
“There is no obedience that does not have its eyes on either God or neighbor. An obedience that is motivated by what we will get out of it is no obedience at all.”
The danger was not necessarily inside the city. Nor was it from an obvious source. Outside the walls of Thyatira, lay a small shrine of white stone.
God is used to working with colorful figures. One of the most colorful in the Bible is Balaam. Hailing from Mesopotamia, Balaam was what we might call a shaman or a soothsayer.
Holding to Jesus’ teaching while denying His divinity presents a host of complications that make it difficult to take one and leave the other.
Your eternal salvation isn’t dependent on performance or effort. Well, not your performance anyway...
The following is an excerpt from Law and Gospel in Action written by Mark Mattes (1517 Publishing, 2019).
Like the Pharisees, as well-meaning, contemporary Christians we too can often add fences to God’s Law.
Pergamum! Oh, Pergamum! Behold the glory of Pergamum! It was not at this time the greatest provincial power, nor was it the most favored in the Roman Empire.