Blonde moment

And the silver spoon.

Saturday, May 03, 2008

And on sermons…

So, this is drill weekend, and even though Josh is at Camp Ripley, I decided to go to Saturday night church. It is my last weekend where I can pretty much do whatever I want all by myself in my house, and so Baby and I decided that sleeping in on Sunday would be a nice thing to do.

Anyway, so I went to Saturday night church. The Sermon was a “My Changed Life” sermon instead of a “Christ Crucified for my sins” sermon. (For an example of what I mean, see Extreme Theology .) The sermon itself was useful, particularly to where Josh and I are in our lives. It was on raising godly kids, but it was missing something… whose fault is it when your kids sin? (By the way, I did bring this to pastor’s attention… clue me in if he mentioned it on Sunday.)

No, this is a really relevant thing here… and it is foundational to Lutheran theology. (And I’d site Book of Concord which is packed.) Josh and I are dirty rotten sinners. We were raised by dirty rotten sinners, and we’re going to raise dirty rotten sinners. My parents are occasionally asked how they got Becky, HG, and me to turn out so well. I’ve heard them say it was nothing they did in particular, they were just blessed by God.

And that is the key difference between a Lutheran Sermon and an Evangelical Sermon. In a Lutheran Sermon, you’ve already screwed things up; an Evangelical Sermon says how not to screw things up, forgetting that things are going to get screwed up. And Lutherans need to spell out the difference.

5 Comments:

  • At 10:44 AM , Blogger TK said...

    Amen! We left our evangelical used-to-be-Lutheran megachurch at the end of 5th and 7th grades for my kids, partly due to the type of things presented in the youth groups. The idea that you can be perfect if you just trust Christ enough is so twisted.

     
  • At 10:55 AM , Blogger Consecutive Odds said...

    I do have to say that our pastor still does the traditional law/gospel sermon most weeks. It is just disappointing when they don't. Particularly on a topic where it is easy to hold one person in account for the bad behavior of others. Still have to like Todd Wilkin's method of sermon evaluation. Was Jesus mentioned... what was Jesus doing... and I forget the other one, pregnancy moment, but something like what am I doing...

     
  • At 9:02 PM , Blogger Scotty J. Williams said...

    And it is floppy things like this that are present in modern Evagelicalism that make me say, "Thank God I'm Reformed and into classical Protestantism.....YAAAAAAAAAY". As always, good blogging Liz.....and by the way, Have you found a good Lutheran, Presbyterian, or Reformed Baptist girl for me?

    Peace,
    ~Scotty

     
  • At 10:03 AM , Blogger Consecutive Odds said...

    Wish I have, Scotty. I really wish I have. I'm praying God will send you one, though. I'll keep looking!

     
  • At 4:47 PM , Anonymous Mouss Kun said...

    Hi greatt reading your post

     

Post a Comment

Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]

<< Home