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Devotions

Appreciating, With Thanksgiving, the Gifts We Have

As children of God we have been richly blessed. If we have to ask how we have been blessed or how richly, that indicates we are taking those gifts for granted.

Above all, we thank God the Father for His love in Christ Jesus. The precious gospel of salvation in Jesus is our greatest blessing, the most secure and enduring. Our salvation is rooted in Christ and His cross; it is sealed by the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. We have the promise that not one of His sheep shall be snatched from Him (John 10:28), and that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life (John 3:16).Read More »Appreciating, With Thanksgiving, the Gifts We Have

“Please Pass…the Word!”

“Man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.” (Deuteronomy 8:3, ESV)

It’s just not Thanksgiving without football?
While it might be missed, we could enjoy the festival without watching a game.

What about celebrating Thanksgiving Day without family around?  

Or what about a Thanksgiving observance without the smell of cooking turkey?

Fellow Christians, let’s be real.
The one thing we truly need for Thanksgiving is the Word of God!

Moses reminded God’s Old Testament people, the children of Israel, of this very thing as they were poised to enter the promised land of Canaan. Read More »“Please Pass…the Word!”

Using the Reformation

Using a gift is a fine way to express appreciation and gratitude.

The sixteenth century Lutheran Reformation was a great gift from God, for through it God restored to us His greatest gifts. Our full and free Salvation in and through Jesus Christ had been put on the shelf by the Roman Catholic Church, which then substituted works that man himself had to accomplish, and God’s undeserved Grace had been shelved in favor of the notion that God infuses grace into man, enabling people to do His will and thus supposedly merit eternal life.

Those precious gifts were all but lost because God’s Word had been put away on a shelf and all but forgotten, being replaced by the teachings of men.Read More »Using the Reformation

Contend Earnestly for the Faith!

In his short epistle Jude wanted more than anything to write about the wonders of “our common salvation” (v. 3), which is the marvelous gospel of God’s gracious love and forgiveness through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. We have been led by the Spirit to appreciate how “God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them” (2 Corinthians 5:19).Read More »Contend Earnestly for the Faith!

Keeping The Wells Unblocked!

Most kids are curious, and I was no different. When I asked my father why a certain pasture which we passed almost every Sunday had a small fenced-off area serving no apparent purpose, he explained what could not be discerned at a distance. A spring of water was being protected from cattle which in the past had blocked up the water’s flow with their trampling hooves.

Isaac was confronted by a similar situation (recorded in Genesis chapter 26). There was a famine in the land, and Isaac was living in Philistine territory by permission. Despite the famine, Isaac’s herds increased, and his planted crops yielded bountifully. The Philistines, envious of his wealth, filled in all the wells his father Abraham had dug there in the hope of limiting Isaac’s power. Then they demanded that Isaac vacate the area.Read More »Keeping The Wells Unblocked!

Membership Has Its Privileges

We understand and appreciate the difference between a church denomination or congregation and the Church—the spiritual Israel, “the Holy Christian Church, the communion of saints” (The Apostles’ Creed).

Through membership in our local congregations the Spirit strengthens us in the Christian faith through His Word and Sacraments; there we praise and worship Him together; there we gather with like-minded believers to encourage and build one another up in our holy faith.

Christ-believers understand their Lord’s directive to “go to church” (Colossians 3:16, Romans 10:17; Hebrews 10:25) as coming from His unconditional love for their spiritual welfare.

But let us consider that, first and foremost, we are at the same time Read More »Membership Has Its Privileges