A BrandOn Life

Anything that we have, our family, our friends, our health, the sight of sea and mountains, is no longer so obviously "ours," once we learn to thank God for it. It becomes, instead, an undeserved gift. That gives a new and joyful vitality to our life. ~Helmut Thielicke, Being a Christian When the Chips Are Down, trans. H. George Anderson, p. 14.

Proclaimed or administered, [word and sacrament] bestow here and now the fruits of Christ's death and resurrection. ~James Arne Nestingen, The Essential Nestingen: Essays on Preaching, Catechism, & the Reformation, 55.

Likewise, they teach that human beings cannot be justified before God by their own powers, merits, or works. But they are justified as a gift on account of Christ through faith when they believe that they are received into grace and that their sins are forgiven on account of Christ, who by his death made satisfaction for our sins. God reckons this faith as righteousness. ~Augsburg Confession 4:1-3 (Latin Text)

Likewise, although the Christian church is, properly speaking, nothing else than the assembly of all believers and saints, yet because in this life many false Christians, hypocrites, and even public sinners remain among the righteous, the sacraments--even though administered by unrighteous priests--are efficacious all the same. ~Augsburg Confession 8:1-2 (German Text)

The Nicene Creed originated because ancient Christians were appalled. A teacher in one of the most influential churches in the world was trying to get them to speak of Christ and say things like "there was once when he was not" and "he came to be out of nothing." They had good reason to be appalled. Christians worship Jesus Christ as Lord, exalted at the right hand of God the Father almighty. To say "there was once when he was not" would be to say that he is not eternal like God the Father--that he came into being from non-existence just like all God's creatures. That would mean he is not really God at all, but one of the things God made. To say this would be to say that what Christians have been doing all along, worshiping Jesus as Lord, is the kind of thing pagans do: worshiping something that is not fully, truly, ultimately God. The Nicence Creed was written to say no, in the strongest possible terms, to that kind of Christian paganism. ~Phillip Cary, The Nicene Creed: An Introduction, 1-2.

In brief, as long as the church teaches the Gospel, it will suffer persecution. ~Martin Luther, Martin Luther's Commentary on Saint Paul's Epistle to the Galatians (1535), trans. Haroldo Camacho, 442.

Without knowledge of the Ten Commandments, the Apostles' Creed, the Lord's Prayer, and the sacraments, a person cannot be considered a Christian, and the Bible remains closed. ~Todd R. Hains, Martin Luther and the Rule of Faith: Reading God's Word for God's People, 77-8.

God's name cannot be abused more flagrantly than when it is used to lie and deceive. Let this be the simplest and clearest explanation of this commandment. ~Large Catechism 1:52

If you are asked, "What does the Second Commandment mean?" or, "What does it mean to take the name of God in vain or to misuse it?" you should answer briefly: "It is a misuse of God's name if we call upon the LORD God in any way whatsoever to support falsehood or wrong of any kind." ~Large Catechism 1:51

Our Lord bound his word of promise to common human things--water, bread, wine, human breath--in Baptism, Holy Communion, and Absolution. ~Todd R. Hains, Martin Luther and the Rule of Faith: Reading God's Word for God's People, 73.

Since God has given us his Word in a living voice, we can see why Luther, although intensively concerned with the text and every letter of the Bible, rates the oral character of the Word more highly than its written form. ~Oswald Bayer, Living by Faith: Justification and Sanctification, 48.

[Luther] does recognize there are no passages in the Bible that explicitly say infants are capable of belief. But Luther builds a formidable case for the faith of infants nonetheless, one that is centered on God's powerful and creative Word. A favorite passage is the account in Luke 1:41 in which John the Baptist leaps in his mother's womb at the greeting of Mary. This would not be possible unless infants were capable of some form of trust. Luther also points to Jesus in Matthew 19:14, where He encourages His followers to become like children, for "to such belongs the kingdom of heaven." If children were incapable of belief, then they would not be held up as models of those ruled by Christ. After all, our Lord welcomed even infants with the words: "Truly, I say to you, whoever doe snot receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it" (Luke 18:17). Finally, Luther notes that in Acts 16:15 it says "entire households" were baptized, which surely points to children being included as well. ~Mark D. Tranvik, "Infant Baptism and Saving Faith" in Luther's Large Catechism with Annotations and Contemporary Applications, 625.

Lutheran theology does not start with notions about human freedom and the potential (great or small) that humans have. Theologies that start with assumption about human freedom end up in bondage. Lutheran theology begins with a person's bondage in sin and ends up with the glorious liberty of the Gospel. ~John T. Pless Pastor Craft, 320.

Look at Adam and Eve. They are full of sin and death. And yet, because they hear the promise concerning the Seed who will crush the serpent's head, they have the same hope we have, namely, that death will be taken away, that sin will be abolished, and that righteousness, life, peace, etc., will be restored. In this hope our first parents live and die, and because of this hope they are truly holy and righteous. ~Martin Luther, "Lectures on Genesis 3:1-15" in The Annotated Luther, vol. 6: The Interpretation of Scripture, 200.

If you are a preacher of grace, then preach a true and not a fictitious grace; if grace is true, you must bear a true and not a fictitious sin. God does not save people who are only fictitious sinners. Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly, for he is victorious over sin, death, and the world. as long as we are here [in this world] we have to sin. This life is not the dwelling place of righteousness, but, as Peter says, we look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. It is enough that by the riches of God’s glory we have come to know the lamb that takes away the sin of the world. No sin will separate us from the Lamb, even though we commit fornication and murder a thousand times a day. Do you think that the purchase price that was paid for the redemption of our sins by so great a Lamb is too small? Pray boldly — you too are a mighty sinner. ~Martin Luther

Christ sits in judgment, which means that grace is the judge, and forgiveness, and love--whoever clings to them has already been acquitted. Those, of course, who want to be judged by their own works, Christ will judge and pass sentence based on those works. But we should be joyful when we think about that day. We need not tremble and hold back, but give ourselves gladly into his hands. Luther dared even to speak of it as that dear day of judgment. ~Dietrich Bonhoeffer, "Turning Back" in The Collected Sermons of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, ed. Isabel Best, 100.