The Nihil Rule

  Youth Rally Attendee Booklet 2024 (welsyouthrally.net) Your humble host is, as usual, fashionably late. The WELS International Youth Rally took place six months ago in Fort Collins, Colorado. The attendee booklet linked above has a number of advertisements in it, including the page shown above, advertising the chance to win one of three $100 Amazon gift cards in exchange for filling out a survey about sex.  The youth rally is aimed at 8th grade through exiting Senior students: the bulk of the attendees are minors. The data were collected by Conquerors through Christ, a WELS organization, funded in part by your congregations' congregational mission offering (CMO). Their  organization chart  shows them as a subsidiary of  WELS Congregational Services .  (Filed under 'Woke' because surveying and data collection is a key component of Social and Emotional Learning , which has taken the WELS by a storm. No doubt the data collected will inform a future Bible stu...

Professor Nichole LaGrow is Director of Non-Traditional Education and Professor of Education at Martin Luther College. Prior to joining MLC she was on the faculty at the University of Wisconsin - Green Bay. She recently gave a presentation at the 2024 Peralta Online Equity Conference, entitled When Equity is Fundamental: Building a Program with Equity at its Center . This presentation was heralded by InFocus magazine  on page 33, much like Prof. Schwartz' presentation on antiracism and BLM . Let's dig in, shall we? We get off on the wrong foot in the introduction, when Professor LaGrow shares her preferred pronouns and her intersectionalities ( 2m56s ).  The use of preferred pronouns is an affront to our God. When Jesus was asked about divorce in Mark chapter 10, He did not appeal to the law of Moses, or the institution of marriage, but rather to the creation account in Genesis chapter 1: "male and female, He created them". The fundamental principle behind marriage ...

  MLC is at it again - or was at it again: I stumbled on a 2022 Open Learning seminar entitled " Ministering in an Age of Diversity " which ticks all the wrong boxes. Six presentations and at least four of them are deemed worthy of the title Woke in the WELS . Let's dig in! The first presentation is entitled "Theory to Practice: Navigating Through Today's Curriculum" by Dr. Kari Muente . We start out with a woke woke wordsalad par excellence : ...it is a continual practice and it is important that we are constantly reflecting on that practice and growing and as our WELS classrooms do become more academically culturally socially emotionally and linguistically diverse it is our responsibility to then go beyond just best practices but engage in evidence-based instruction and curriculum that ensures that all of our students have equal access to the curriculum... Around the 23 minute mark we are introduced to five philosophies of education ranging from perenniali...

(Dropping this at 4PM on a Friday is rather ominous) The Conference of Presidents (COP) has finished their work on a pastoral brief addressing Critical Theory and justice . (Note: the link is to my Google drive. The WELS distributed this initially to Pastors, and it will be published online next month.) The CoP is comprised by the Presidents of the twelve WELS districts and this document was authored by them and any consultants they chose to bring on. The impetus for this document was a memorial for the 2023 Synod Convention. Here is the original memorial as published in the BORAM : During the convention there was a fair bit of conversation on the memorial and it's wording. Much of the conversation belied a poor understanding of critical theory and social justice (although a few Pastors were very on point in their comments) and how it is affecting the laity. Ultimately the memorial was revised and accepted. The revised language follows: Comparing the two, you can see the 'mista...

[  Leaders' Guide  |  Video 1  |  Video 2  |  Video 3  |  Video 4  |  Video 5  ] for the love of God, make it stop! Seriously, you guys, I thought I was done with this thing. But apparently feedback has made its way to synod because there is now revised verbiage on the landing page and an edited leader's guide. In addition, there is a brief summary of the COP statement on sexuality.  The videos are unedited as of this writing; so, any massaging of the landing page and leaders' guide is just to try and assuage the reader. The substance of this Bible study has not changed . Every criticism levied at the five videos remains in play. Revised Landing Page Let's take a closer look at the five "Approach" bullets. An Honest Conversation is a glimpse into a conversation that is not happening, but should be happening with our youth. It’s not meant to be the final word, nor the only word, but to prompt further dialogue on this matter...

    [ Leaders' Guide | Video 1 | Video 2 | Video 3 | Video 4 | Video 5 ] We complete the series with Video Five , which kicks off with a discussion on choosing "choosing a lifestyle over Jesus... because they felt like they had to choose." Yes, if you want to live a lifestyle that is condemned by the Bible then yes, you have to choose. Am I going to deny myself and reject a LGBTQ+ lifestyle, or am I going to deny my Savior? This is a 1 Corinthians 10 thing - you can't commune with the Lord and with demons, you have to choose. Now certainly (as I've reiterated several times) one can struggle with an LGBTQ+ desire, but in struggling with that desire you are denying yourself and following Christ.  There is a common thread about singleness laced throughout the video. First, we have the same young lady quoted above reminding us that "relationships aren't a thing in heaven" so apparently, they shouldn't be a big deal here on earth - except, of co...

     [  Leaders' Guide  |  Video 1  |  Video 2  |  Video 3  |  Video 4  |  Video 5  ] And on to Video Four , where we are going to focus on one of the panelists. For the first three videos I tried to avoid this for a few reasons: first, I remember being in my late teens and having some pretty bad takes, secondly, we should really be holding Ben and Bill responsible for the content since they are moderating and producing this thing. In video 5 you can hear Bill off-camera guiding a discussion point - which changed my mind since this isn't just eavesdropping on some teens having a discussion, they are being actively guided to hit certain points, and in video 2 there were definite overtones of the youth 'getting it' in contrast with the older generations. So let us examine the wisdom of the youth. We're going to focus on the woman in yellow, who I would guess based on her comments is studying to be an education maj...

  [  Leaders' Guide  |  Video 1  |  Video 2  |  Video 3  |  Video 4  |  Video 5  ] And on to Video Three , which comes hot out of the gate with the assertion "They need to know Jesus first then you can get to the hard stuff" - an inversion of law and gospel. It's the law that convicts us, and after it has done its work on our heart of stone, we are opened up to the sweet proclamation of the Gospel. Why do you need a Savior if you don't recognize your sin? We move on to the question "What are some mistakes Christians have made in their attempt to share God's Word?" Bill's answer: "Be cautious about forcing a point of view" ... "it's about first having a listening ear" ... "we need to be careful that our whole goal isn't to moralize, change behavior, stand on politics, associating that completely with our faith, but instead, you know, winning the trust of someone" Is it possible to have a faith divorced of mora...

[  Leaders' Guide  |  Video 1  |  Video 2  |  Video 3  |  Video 4  |  Video 5  ] Videos Two  has been posted for "An Honest Conversation about Sexuality."   After a brief introduction from Ben and Bill, we return to our panelists, who make the assertion "[LGBTQ] is just another sin, right?" And, out of the mouths of babes... the second panelist makes the assertion that the church follows culture, and so when culture changes the church is left holding the bag. My sweet summer child ... I certainly understand the confusion as our synod is chasing the culture. This should not be, and that's why we're talking about it. We get to our first pause for questions at the six minute mark. I'll list the questions and the answers that Bill and Ben give later in the episode. Question One: What are some of the challenges that get in the way of having a conversation? After the break, Bill suggests our use of language is a barrier, as...

  [  Leaders' Guide  |  Video 1  |  Video 2  |  Video 3  |  Video 4  |  Video 5  ] An Honest Conversation About Sexuality – Video 1 Well, what do you know. Pastor Bill Monday - affiliated with 922 ministries (aka The Core, Mike Novotny , etc.). I've gotten a few anonymous tips about his ministry to homosexuals, but I hadn't followed up on those to date - mea culpa - I'll do that in the near future.  His co-presenter, Ben Dose, is "not a congregation member" but a "lifelong Lutheran" who struggles with same-sex attraction and is a self-proclaimed "representative of the LGBTQ community" who is here to "put a human face on it" and "bring a level of empathy". First - one can struggle with same-sex attraction much as a young straight man might struggle with chastity or porn - but the Christian will deny himself and repent of his weakness and look to God for strength. They won't identify with their sin as Ben does in ident...