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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Here’s a little “devotional” for you; some thoughts on Law and Gospel from Gerhard Forde. Drink deep, drink full. These are rich streams of thought.
Biblically speaking, we won’t find much evidence for a preordained spouse.
The simul makes several affirmations and rejections on the doctrines of sin/original sin, justification, and sanctification, to name a few.
A person, not a nation, can be a Christian because only a person can be saved by grace through faith in the work of Christ.
We confuse our success and failures with God’s judgment of us.
It wasn’t that I didn’t love. I loved deeply, but I was also aware of the much deeper reservoir of self-love that kept me from ever loving fully.
I don't remember a time not knowing I was a sinner. Seriously, I've always understood that Christ died for me.
Preaching is simply the verbal bestowal of what Scripture has already given us in written form
As I weigh briefly here the advantages and disadvantages of preaching original sin and preaching actual sin, I don’t mean to argue for one and against the other. Instead, I mean to suggest a benefit in focusing a given sermon on one or the other, and that neither type of sermon should be the only type a Christian hears.
It is a strange irony, but in a world drunk on violence, it is only on the cross of violence that there is hope for peace in our world.
The following is an excerpt from “Let the Bird Fly” written by Wade Johnston (1517 Publishing, 2019).
The real problem with the way we talk about Baptism in particular, and the sacraments at all, is that we are simply afraid of letting God’s Word get us.