When Jesus washes you with baptismal water, you can rest assured that the Lion of Judah is on the move.
The life we are trying to manage, improve, and secure is not something to be mastered. It is something to be surrendered. And this is where everything changes. Because in Christ, the approval we are seeking has already been spoken.
It is within this charged atmosphere that Luther’s writings take on their full significance. His responses to the Turkish threat were not merely reactions to military events; they were rooted in a deep theological reflection on the nature of God’s rule over the world, the responsibilities of Christian rulers, and the role of the Church in times of crisis.

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In this final article in the series, “The Lord’s Prayer During Lent,” Philip Bartelt talks about the 7th Petition (“Deliver us from evil”) and the Conclusion (“For Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever and ever. Amen.”)
This petition is proof that the Christian life is not a practice in perfectionism. Rather, it is a life of dying and rising, lived under the cross of Christ, in the continual forgiveness of our sins.
God says, “Cross,” and we say, “Glory!” Sometimes – a lot of times – he knocks the glory glasses off our faces.
This article is the second installment in an eight-part series inspired by the Lenten themes of catechesis, prayer, and repentance found in the Lord’s Prayer as Luther taught it in his Small Catechism.
Transfiguration is like a farewell party for a dear friend drafted and going off to war. We celebrate all that has brought us there, we rejoice in our friend, and yet we know we are sending him off to great danger.
God interrupts Peter, but not only to quiet him. He also directs Peter to listen to someone else.
The coming of Jesus the Son was the fulfillment of all the Old Testament promises and prophesies, types and covenants. His resurrection and, as Peter asserts here, His transfiguration proved it.
Because God makes the rules He is free to break them when He chooses, however, God only breaks His own rules on the side of grace!
The Church gathers around the Word and Sacrament in order to receive Christ and each other.
We can rejoice in our own need and the gift we receive through baptism given by the same one by whom John desired to be baptized.
We live in the strength of our baptism again and again and again, returning to it every day according to God's promise. 
In chapter 41 the servant is identified as Israel, but chapter 42 is a different servant. In fact, Matthew 12:18-21 makes the ID clear—this Servant is Jesus!