The Secret Wireless

Holy Week and Easter are upon us. Soon we shall be confessing the ancient Christian liturgy of praise: “Christ is risen! He is risen indeed. Alleluia!” The resurrection of Jesus is the linchpin of the Christian faith. Without it everything falls apart. Saint Paul recognized this back in I Corinthians 15. “And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins…. If in this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.” Or as Saint John put it in his first letter: “No one who denies the Son has the Father. Whoever confesses the Son has the Father also.” If we misread the life of Jesus we will miss the entire plan of the Father to make us righteous and worthy of eternal life. The fact that Jesus Christ has risen from the dead is a historical fact. The evidence is just as great for Jesus being raised from the dead as any ancient historical event. And that is not simply looking at the Bible with a naïve eye. Arche...

“The blood of Jesus [God’s] Son cleanses us from all sin.” I John 1:7 Friends in Christ, There has been much talk recently about the future of religious freedom. Both the federal government and the State of Illinois seem to be intent upon infringing upon the right of religious organizations to worship, believe, practice, and act as we believe God would have us do. Charitable organizations such as Lutheran Child and Family Services and Catholic Charities who obviously have religious roots are being forced to provide adoption services to homosexual couples or lose all state contracts. The Federal Department of Health and Human Services has mandated that religious organizations must provide health insurance coverage of contraceptives and abortive drugs (the so-called “Plan B” pill). These things violate the religious beliefs of, not only LCMS Lutherans, but millions of Americans from across a broad spectrum of religions. I encourage you to contact your representatives c...

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ, In response to President Obama’s announcement Friday concerning an “accommodation” to a previous mandate that health plans must cover all forms of birth control (even those that can kill the unborn), The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod (LCMS) remains deeply concerned. We strongly object to the use of drugs and procedures that are used to take the lives of unborn children, who are persons in the sight of God from the time of conception. Drugs such as “Plan B” and “Ella,” which are still included in the mandate, can work post-conception to cause the death of the developing child, so don’t be fooled by statements to the contrary. We see President Obama’s action Friday as significant, in that it appears to have been prompted by the many voices united in concern over an infringement of our religious liberties. But the “accommodation” did not expand the exemption for religious employers, nor did it restrict the mandate in any way. It simply described...

I have heard the comparison made between the Christian faith and a pizza. It was said that with pizza, as long as you have crust, sauce, and cheese, you can put whatever you want on top and it remains a pizza. It doesn’t matter if you have sausage, onions, anchovies, or whatever. Pizza is pizza as long as it has crust, sauce, and cheese. And so the Christian faith is still Christian as long as it has some essentials, like Jesus, the Gospel, and faith. You can add whatever you want on top of that to suit your own fancy as long as you have the essentials. My question for people who think this way is this: how much garbage do you want on your pizza? Would you eat a pizza covered with mold, rotten tomatoes, dirty shoestrings, or used Kleenex? Of course not! Why then would you tolerate a Christian faith where there was clearly false teaching? Why would you want to listen to a false prophet? If something is untrue then it is a lie. If it is a lie then it is garbage....

"A generation ago it was customary in Lutheran circles for pastors to devote two years to teaching young people Luther's Small Catechism. I once heard of a pastor in St Louis, Missouri, whose practice it was to divide those two years of instruction as follows: 'The first year,' he said, 'I have the students memorize the Catechism. The second year I tell them what it means.' "I first learned of this pastor when I was a young man, and like others my age I guffawed. How ridiculous! The whole point of catechism instruction is to help young people understand the meaning of the Lord's Prayer, the Ten Commandments, the Creed. What is the value of having youngsters memorize the words of the Catechism without telling them what they mean? Now years later I realize that this pastor was much wiser than I. He knew that Christian faith was a matter of words, and that what counted most in the Catechism were the words." (from Robert L.Wilken. "Introdu...

I recently watched two very different Christmas specials. The first one, I am not even sure of the title. It is something like "A Shrek Christmas". I caught it about half way through, but I don't think that will make much difference to the ending. Shrek (a large green ogre with a big green ogre family) has apparently never celebrated Christmas before. So he buys a book, something like "Christmas for Dummies". He creates a feast, gets a tree and decorates it, buys tons of gifts. But his Christmas if far from perfect. There is too much chaos and commotion. Finally Shrek has to learn the real meaning of Christmas: family and chaos. What?! That's right, the point of Christmas, according to Shrek, is to have lots of family and lots of chaos. Let us compare this to another Christmas program from another era. Charlie Brown wanted to know what Christmas was all about. Was it about pageants and plays? Was it about cards and presents, Santa Claus and ...