The Nihil Rule

  Explanation for Those who Don't get Memes:  This is a meme template called "Bad Luck Brian". You see, this template expressed the frustration of having an expectation but not having that expectation fulfilled - attributed to 'bad luck' - or as Solomon tells us, 'Time and chance happen to all' (Ecclesiastes 9:11). Brian's church sings "This is the Feast" (CW21 938) as a song of celebration in the season of Easter. Brian realizes the feast of victory is Holy Communion. He expects then that since we're singing about it, we'd participate in it. But no! His congregation only communes twice a month, and it's an off-Sunday. Or maybe even Easter Sunday, where we don't serve communion as not to 'offend' the visitors. Which is kind of silly since the Bible doesn't talk about off-Sundays: The New Testament connects the Eucharist to weekly worship (Acts 2:42) and the pattern throughout the Old Testament is that feasting acco...

  Straight talk: Finding a healthy balance – FORWARD IN CHRIST What it boils down to is balancing trusting God’s power, promises, and ability to do “immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine” (Ephesians 3:20), while not putting him to the test, expecting blessings we have not historically seen, and being poor stewards of our God-given resources. The 100 in 10 program is not quite as ambitious as it appears to be, given on average we planted about five churches a year prior to the program. And the churches the 100 in 10 program have been planting are, to be frank, not very Lutheran in appearance - by and large strip mall churches with contemporary worship and the like - as promoted in various WELS Connections. It's probably less putting God to the test (Malachi 3:10) and more straying from fidelity to the faith our fathers have handed down to us by not instilling in our young men the desire for the excellent task (1 Timothy 3:1) and by building "Neighborhood Walmart's...

  Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary posted the first image; WELS, Inc.  posted the second.  Don't make me explain the meme .

a savage  myth: busted. Preferred pronouns have been in the air. You might have noticed my Evangelical Admonition to Faithful Confession ; Dr. Koontz' podcast about  preferable pronouns  dropped shortly thereafter; followed up by a New Years article by yours truly:  But I speak of Christ and the Church , and then yet another Dr. Koontz episode expanding on the pronoun issue . All tied up into one tidy package by the Men who, indeed Understood the Times . A blessed convergence! God works in mysterious ways.  In my first article I was addressing three specific occurrences of WELS persons (all members of the WELS Committee on Identity, Gender, and Sexuality - a committee not listed on the WELS website, ostensibly for " OPSEC reasons" - but as a buddy of mine opined "they are probably more worried about the WELS backlash than the secular one") promoting the utilization of preferred pronouns as either being not-sin, or dismissing the question of pronou...

  Men who Understood the Times: Do we have a Pronoun Hospitality Problem? The men were kind enough to link  to two  of my Substack articles and discuss the quote from August Pieper: “[T]here is no excuse for those who think it unnecessary to tell unbelievers about their sins right to their face and to condemn their ways with the written law, since the gospel alone is God’s power for salvation, and so it is enough to make these tidings known to the world. This opinion is not based on Scripture, but on their own wisdom. It is born of their fear of men and of the curse of the cross... Wanting to be silent about sin and win the impenitent only with the sweetness of the gospel amounts to denying God’s zeal and holiness and suppressing his threats. It amounts to hypocrisy, practicing spiritual quackery. It means leading the poor people to fleshly security instead of to faith and casting pearls before the swine. Under all circumstances the impenitent need the law, and only next,...

  A favorite of certain   pastors , MLC professors , MLK openly denied the divinity of Christ, the virgin birth, and his resurrection. He's a baaaad man .

  Brief#32 Preferable Pronouns

  An Evangelical Admonition to Faithful Confession " when the rich young ruler came to Jesus, Jesus loved him and he told him the one thing that he could not accept to hear. Being told that he had to give up his wealth in order to follow Jesus struck at the root of his sin - you might even say it struck at his  identity . But Jesus loved him, and He brought every facet of himself to the situation. In the same way when we encounter the LGBTQ+, we love them, and we tell them the one thing that they cannot bear to hear. We tell them in love that their lifestyle of sin is not right. It violates God’s law. By doing so we love them in the Biblical sense so that their hearts might be opened to the sweetness of the Gospel to heal and restore."

 The original webmaster of the Motley Magpie website, which I have since repristinated, reached out and provided me the Rubrics Cube graphics which I had assumed were lost to time. God bless you, Aart! (I know I've been quiet, but a storms a'brewin'... )

  Men Who Understood the Times | Substack A new podcast just dropped hosted by Pastor Zarling with guests Pastor Andy Mueller and high school teacher Joshua Nelson. Three men who, indeed, understand the times.  (These names should be familiar - we've reviewed Pastor Zarling's book , Pastor Andy Mueller's presentation on Critical Theory in the light of Scripture , and Joshua Nelson's thoughts on the convention and his presentations at two apologetics conferences . Good men coming together for what promises to be a good podcast series!)