The Trouble with Dressing Up
The parable of the wedding banquet in Matthew hinges on whether a guy is wearing the right costume for the party.
Contributors
Ken Sundet Jones
Ken Sundet Jones, Professor of Theology and Philosophy at Grand View University in Des Moines, Iowa, loves teaching undergrads. He was born in Heidelberg, which must be why he likes Luther so much. He was shaped by the Sturgis motorcycle rally in his hometown and by summers at his grandparents’ cattle ranch. His doctoral dissertation covered 16th-century German evangelical funeral preaching. And he knows how to do knitting and Scandinavian flat-plane woodcarving.
Most Recent
The Role of the Gospel Amidst Change
I will continue to cling to the only hope I’ve ever truly had: that Jesus is my Lord and yours.
Unimagined Freedom and Forgiveness in Hamilton
In the quiet of your own uptown, where your own sins bear down on you and create a troubled conscience before the world, before others, and before God, your Lord reaches across the chasm of brokenness to take your hand.
Wellspring of the Joy of Living
The following is an excerpt from Ken Sundet Jones’ chapter in “Who Am I?” written by Scott Ashmon (1517 Publishing, 2020).
You Can't Handle God
The kingdom I seek is the lower-case realm ruled over by the almighty upper-case Me.
What Makes a Theologian of the Cross?
Christ isn’t preached in his glory but in his ignominy, his utter shame, degradation, and desolation.
Bible Stories Too Dangerous for Sunday Morning
Dangerous Bible stories show us a God who has no problem whatsoever using the muck and mire of our worst days to make his progress toward his good goal happen.
Elisabeth Cruciger: Hymn Writer of the Reformation
Elisabeth Cruciger is the first female Lutheran hymn writer. In fact, her hymn was included in the very first evangelical hymnal, published in 1524. With her life and her hymn, she becomes a witness, an example, and a proclaimer of the gospel to us almost 500 years later.
Temptation’s Green Pastures: The Sixth Petition of the Lord’s Prayer
The gospel promise is that God in Christ knows exactly what your temptations are and still bids you find protection from them in him.
In Memory of Katharina von Bora, Part 2
In some measure, if Luther had any success during his last two decades, it happened because of the woman who’d insisted on him as her bridegroom.
In Memory of Katharina von Bora, Part 1
Her importance goes beyond simply managing the reformer’s household.
The Mix that Makes Salvation Work (aka the Hypostatic Union of Christ)
Understanding the doctrine of the hypostatic union can help us understand what God is up to in the Incarnation.
Reformation Day: Hey Beggar, You're Free!
When we hear freedom, we have to ask about its opposite, bondage.
Luther's Counsel for the Sick and Dying
As usual, Luther took what he received and turned it inside-out, so that it shifted from a series of demands and became a bestowal of God’s gracious promise.
It is Finished
And when He says, “It is finished,” He doesn’t just mean His life and ministry. He means you, your sin, your brokenness, and ultimately your death.
Ken Jones: The Unforgivable sin
In April of 2019, Christ Hold Fast held a one-day event in Des Moines, Iowa focused on The Hard Sayings of Jesus. Speakers from around the country came together to speak to this topic.
The Feast of Easter
All the piety, rigor, and discipline presented to the world by the believers, the General knew, was done out of fear and the denial of God’s grace
Luther on the Verge: Burning the Papal Bull
The Pope Leo X used the psalm description of a boar uprooting grape vines in a vineyard as a metaphor for what the upstart German monk had been doing at that backwater university.
A Simple Thanksgiving
God’s gifts are received, and the faithful heart offers gratias, and thanks are given in return.
The Treacherous Territory of Preaching Thanksgiving
We are awfully close to the tipping point where Thanksgiving falls completely into the clutches of the advertising world. Where the holiday is treated as just another excuse to get you to buy more stuff and accumulate more goods.
Election Hacking
Divine election hacking happens with the proposal that God’s Word is irrelevant and powerless, weak and impotent.
Learning the Cycle of Gospel Proclamation
True preaching arises when the Holy Spirit steeps the proclaimer in its own cycle of judgment and mercy.
Smashing Babies and Scarred Hands
Whatever loss you’ve undergone, whatever grief resides in the hollow of your heart, however much it seems like God has abandoned you, God sees that void as the place he wants to fill with new life and mercy.
A Look at True Proclamation of the Gospel
The Confessions instead look forward and provide a critique of the world and of all my various religions and idolatries.
Upcoming Events
Here We Still Stand 2021
Consciences Captive to the Word of God