Free Republic

“Departing in Peace” (Luke 2:22-40) Are you ready to go? What I mean is, are you ready to leave? No, I don’t mean right now. It would be nice if you’d stick around until the end of the service. But then, at the end of the service, will you be ready to leave? Will you be ready to depart in peace, satisfied and content and ready for whatever comes next? What makes you ready to leave, to leave any situation? For instance, this year is coming to an end. Are you ready to put 2023 behind you and move on...

“Christ Will Build His Church” (Matthew 16:13-20) “Will we have to shut the doors?” I’m guessing some of you at least have had that thought cross your mind recently. “Will we have to shut the doors of our church? Will our little congregation make it? Do we have enough people, do we have enough money, to keep the doors open?” And I can understand how you might think like that. Yes, our church is small. And on top of that, your pastor came down with cancer and moved out of state. And the guy filling in for him, the man...

In May 2022, Luther Seminary helped to bring Beyoncé Mass at the Plymouth Congregational Church in South Minneapolis. Luther Seminary is the largest seminary of the heretical Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), with 412 students, and is about as progressive an institution as they come. Beyoncé Mass is “a womanist worship service that uses the music and personal life of Beyoncé as a tool to foster an empowering conversation about Black women—their lives, their bodies, and their voices.” It was created and organized by theologian and ‘reverend’ Yolanda Norton, who, as the Chair of Black Church Studies at San...

Christ Lutheran Church in Blaine, MN, is led by impastor Sarah E. Moat and has the distinction of being one of the more progressive “churches” we’ve ever come across. A quintessential Evangelical Lutheran Church in America congregation, pastrix Moat is not content to refer to LGBTQ peeps with that moniker but insists on doing the whole ‘LGBTQIA2S+’ each time (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and/or gender expansive, queer and/or questioning, intersex, asexual, and two-spirit) lest she exclude someone. She explains that they formed a welcoming team in 2020 “with a focus on ensuring that “LGBTQIA2S+ people have a safe space within...

Last Sunday, former head of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) Mark Hanson preached a sermon at Elk River Lutheran Church in Elk River, Minnesota, where he went off on Jesus, describing him as mean, cruel, troubling, an advocate of Nimbyism (Not in My Backyard) and quite frankly, even a little racist. It’s no big surprise, as the (ELCA) is functionally one of the most heretical and demonic denominations in America. It has denigrated to one massive pen for goats, run by spiritual criminals and hirelings, with barely a sheep to be found anywhere. From Planned Parenthood Logo on...

We fought endless wars overseas for two decades, only to bring in record numbers of refugees from the very places from which we sought to protect ourselves. Thanks to mass Middle East migration as the only remaining legacy of the trillions of dollars pumped into the “Global War on Terror,” America’s heartland is just as vulnerable to Islamic terror as New York and Los Angeles. Believe it or not, there was an Islamic terror attack in Fargo, North Dakota, earlier this month, one that local law enforcement believes could have resulted in countless casualties instead of the one police officer...

VIDEOWe had a recent health alert for our friend, Pastor Charles Henrickson. However, as you can see in this video of Charles at the LCMS (Lutheran Church Missouri Synod) convention in Milwaukee on Monday, he is alive and well and verrrrry informal. It was mentioned in the Free Republic that Charles was scheduled for a PET scan and I am happy to tell you that he has reported on Facebook that scan showed his cancer is limited to his lung and has not spread to the rest of his body. Perhaps we shall have more videos of informal Charles at...

For many years, Pastor Charles Henrickson has posted a good Scriptural sermon here on FR. Please pray for him. He has a health challenge; that's all I can say. Some laudable things about Pastor Henrickson: - he has posted a very good Confessional Lutheran sermon here every week for a long time - he uses his real name - he's openly being a member of Free Republic when so many, even in a conservative church body, would look down upon him for that. I don't know any other MO Synod pastor who does this, and I know quite a few....

The Evangelical Lutheran Church of America (ELCA) is a simmering cauldron of blasphemy and mephistopjlean angst, to the point that sitting through an actual church service at one of their pagan temples is a foretaste of the hell that awaits them if they don’t repent. Some of the denomination’s greatest hits include: Woke Church Newsletter Invites Congregants To Help Pay for Abortions and Abortion Pills Pastrix Says Jesus Called Syrophoenician Woman a ‘B*****’ + “Jesus Screwed Up, She Redeems Him” Queer ELCA Pastrix Ordained With Drag Queen Nuns While Jennifer Knapp Serenades This brings us to Lura Groen, the pastrix...

Concordia Seminary is the affiliated seminary of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod in two locations St. Louis, Missouri and Fort Wayne, Indiana. Like other denominations, the LCMS is not immune to wokeness. However they are reticent to stand up against wokeness and eager to crack down on young Lutherans who oppose the liberal drift in their denomination. As with liberal drift historically, seminaries are often where they start. A former professor of Concordia Seminary write an article on their blog titled “The Future of the Missouri Synod” which reads like an establishment Republicans strategy from 2013. The current Synodical demographics...

“I believe in a non-binary god, whose pronouns are plural,” Pastor Anna Helgen said. “I believe in Jesus Christ, their child, who wore a fabulous tunic and had two dads.” THE SPARKLE CREED Rev. Rachel Small Stokes I believe in the non-binary God whose pronouns are plural. I believe in Jesus Christ, their child, who wore a fabulous tunic and had two dads, and who saw everyone as a sibling child of God. I believe in the rainbow Spirit, who shatters our image of one white light and refracts it into a rainbow of gorgeous diversity. I believe in the...

“Now is the time to say . . . ‘God is queer.’” Who spoke these blasphemous words, and what was the context of the statement?

“The Blessing of Confessing the Augsburg Confession” (Psalm 119:46) Today Lutheran churches around the world are celebrating the 493rd anniversary of the Presentation of the Augsburg Confession. It was on June 25, 1530, in the city of Augsburg, Germany, that a group of Lutheran princes took a confession of their faith, composed by Luther’s associate Philip Melanchthon, and presented it to Emperor Charles V. This Augsburg Confession summarizes what Lutheran churches believe, teach, and confess, on the basis of Holy Scripture. And what a blessing this confession has proved to be! Not only did it confess the truth in 1530,...

“The One Man Adam and the One Man Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:6-15) As by one man all mankind fell And, born in sin, was doomed to hell, So by one Man, who took our place, We all were justified by grace. So we just sang, and so is the message of our Epistle reading today, from Romans chapter 5. As it says in verse 15 of our text: “For if many died through one man’s trespass, much more have the grace of God and the free gift by the grace of that one man Jesus Christ abounded for many.” In...

“Follow Me, the Doctor of Mercy” (Matthew 9:9-13) In the Holy Gospel for today, Jesus calls Matthew to follow him and be his disciple. Jesus calls him, even though Matthew was looked down upon as an obvious sinner. But Jesus is the great physician who has mercy on those who are sick with sin. And so, as Jesus calls us today also, he says to each one of us, “Follow Me, the Doctor of Mercy.” We know Matthew as St. Matthew the Apostle. But that’s not how he started out. For he had something in common with quite a few...

“Baptized in the Name: Confidence, Belonging, Relationship, Identity” (Matthew 28:16-20) Sometime during the forty days between his resurrection and his ascension, our Lord Jesus Christ met with his disciples on a mountain in Galilee, and he told them: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” And that is what the church has done for all these many centuries. And that is what has happened to you, every one of you...

“Rivers of Living Water” (John 7:37-39)Last weekend Susan and I went to Excelsior Springs, Missouri, to attend the wedding of Pastor and Mrs. Paul Flo. Excelsior Springs got its name and its fame long ago from the springs of water located there--healthful, healing waters, with restorative powers, it was said. Well, it so happened that when we went out there on that Friday, I wasn’t feeling so well. But when we returned on Sunday evening, I came back . . . with a bad case of acute bronchitis. I guess the healing waters of Excelsior Springs didn’t do me much...

“Thus It Is Written, Thus You Shall Preach” (Luke 24:44-53) During the forty days from Christ’s resurrection to his ascension, our Lord met with his disciples on a number of occasions. Jesus was preparing these disciples to be his apostles, his sent-out ones, who would preach and teach and begin to carry out the church’s worldwide mission. So he needed to instruct them, to make it clear to them what their mission would be. And that’s what we find going on in the reading today from Luke 24. Jesus makes clear what the content of their preaching and teaching will...

“I Perceive That You Are Not Very Religious” (Acts 17:16-31) In our reading from the Book of Acts, Paul is in Athens, at the Areopagus, and he begins his address there by saying, “Men of Athens, I perceive that in every way you are very religious.” Now I wonder how Paul might begin a speech here, if he came to America in our day. He might just say, “I Perceive That You Are Not Very Religious.” Not very religious: Let me explain. If you track the views and activity of Americans over recent decades, you would have to say that...

“Our Identity as Church: Living Stones and a Holy Priesthood” (1 Peter 2:2-10) There’s a lot of talk about “identity” these days. How do you “identify”? What do you identify as? A guy may be born as a male, but now he decides that he identifies as a woman. It doesn’t matter what the reality is, because that’s how he identifies. Whoops, I should watch my pronouns: If that’s how “she” identifies, then that’s who “she” is. And you have no right to say any different. Identity. How do you self-identify? How do you see yourself? “I’m an American!” “I’m...