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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This is an excerpt from part two of “On Any Given Sunday: The Story of Christ in the Divine Service” by Mike Berg (1517 Publishing, 2023).
You are not alone if you find it difficult to wrap your mind around the auspices of the Old Testament sacrificial system.
My fear of this coming darkness only lasts a moment.
We can’t predict the harvest. We can only sow.
Some explanations are better than others, but they remain our explanations—except if we had some perspective from outside, above, and behind nature.
To believe God is love and thus loves you is a miracle wrought by the Holy Spirit.
His love for you is so deep that in his mercy, while you were yet a sinner, God sent his only begotten Son to die for you.
“So loved,” then isn’t about how much but instead simply how.
Love is pointing to Jesus who said, “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).
As the writer to the Hebrews affirms, what makes the Christian gospel so much better is that we are no longer dealing with “types and shadows."
When we pray to Jesus, we pray to the King's right hand. We know one who has the Father's ear, respect and trust. And the one who intercedes for us is still one of us, with nail-pierced hands.
Who would ever want all these screamers and haters? It turns out that Christ does.