Its Time: LCMS Unity and Mission

You may have seen this floating around the net, but, if not, I'm posting it here.

Matt Harrison has been and is a great and needed voice in the LC-MS. He has courageously, yet temperately, addressed the issues that face our Synod. Like the great unifiers before him, Melanchthon and Chemnitz, Harrison is a leisetreter, one who treads lightly, not given to polemics, rhetoric, or party spirit. The longer we avoid addressing these issues the worse our situation will become. Rather than moving full steam ahead with various programs and initiatives, we need to stop a reassess our situation and determine "who we are" and what we are about.

Its Time: LCMS Unity and Mission

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The Dark Reality of Sinful Humanity

Pastor Harrison over at Mercy Journeys has just posted an interesting reflection on Nietzche from a quote of his: "Perhaps I know best why it is man alone who laughs; he alone suffers so deeply that he had to invent laughter."

This is what pastor Harrison has to say:

"Nietzche understood the dark reality of sinful humanity like few others in history, and it drove him insane. Unfortunately this son of a pastor did not recognize the profound divine answer for the human predicament - Christ. Laughter is no human invention by the way, it's a divine gift. And its particularly delightful when its freed by grace to become a full, round belly laugh... above all at ourselves. MH

p.s. You have to appreciate N.'s world class mustache..."

This is what I have always appreciated about Continental secularism in comparison to American secularism. Europeans have an intimate understanding of what the real implications are if "God is dead." Unlike their American counterparts, Europeans don't mask the very dark reality that life takes on when one denies the existence of God. Americans are so inundated with materialism, capitalism, self-sufficiency, self-pleasure, sex, and any other god there might be, that they are oblivious of the complete meaninglessness of existence without God. At least Europeans don't hide it.

Are Our Best Days Behind Us?

Matt Harrison has created the best LC-MS blog around. If you have not stopped by, I highly encourage that you do. He is always posting things from the early days of the synod (translating them on a drop of a hat it seems). This post from him: Are Our Best Days Behind Us? Schwan 1865, is a great self assesment that we should always be asking as a synod. This is Harrison's introduction:

"H.C. Schwan was president of the LCMS Central District in 1865. As the Synod was approaching its twentieth anniversary, he honestly asked the question: Are our best days behind us? Schwan aludes to Luther's comment that he gospel is like a "passing rain shower," which does not return where it has passed. All five of the German born presidents of the Synod knew this passage of Luther, and all used it as a call to repentance for their day. Lord have mercy upon us. Matt H"

Make sure to stop by his blog and read what H.C. Schwan has to say.