When we consider our own end, it will not bring us into a final wrestling match with the messenger of God, but into the embrace of the Messiah of God.
What do such callings look like? They are ordinary and everyday.
This is the third in a series meant to let the Christian tradition speak for itself, the way it has carried Christians through long winters, confusion, and joy for centuries.

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Christ alone has finished your salvation. Christ alone could and has made satisfaction for your sins.
By Philip Melanchthon (from the 1535 Loci Communes), translated by Scott L. Keith, Ph.D.
So what's the back side? What's the promise? We shall not have other gods, but we do have the one, true God—the promise of a God for us.
All other subjects—even Biblical subjects—were subservient to an accurate view of the Person and work of Jesus Christ for sinners.
The pirates spent their lives seeking after the treasure and after finally attaining it, they discover that it was cursed. Instead of satisfying their empty souls, it only intensified their cravings.
The biblical witness is clear: all the so-called gods and lords and idols who are the object of people’s devotion, to whom they offer their sacrifices, to whom they pray, whom they call God and Lord, are sadly nothing but a front for the father of lies.
Have you ever read scripture and been caught by a crippling wave of guilt, shame and fear? Have you sat with your Bible open in front of you and thought, “Well, if this is the case, I might as well pack it in right now, because there’s no hope for me!”
Dan reminded me—in his words, in his patient suffering, through his unwavering faith in Christ, by his confidence in his baptism—that Jesus Christ does not abandon his own. No matter where they are, no matter what they’re going through, He is there.
What if, while we were admitting all these serious infractions of the divine law, our pastor simply yawned?
We are a sinning church with a preaching problem.
I love stories with happy endings! My husband makes fun of me, but he has been known to graciously sit through a variety of schmaltzy chick flicks because he knows how I feel.
When we begin singing the opening hymn, our voices blend with those of angels in heaven, who have been belting out hymns long before we rolled out of bed that morning.