preaching

The Isolated Pastor

By Bob Hiller –

Well, if my calculations are correct, by the time you read this blog (I am writing this on Tuesday night), the Golden State Warriors will be on the brink of completing their undefeated playoff run by sweeping the Cleveland Cavaliers out of the NBA Finals. (Though, if you read my blog, you know my calculations are rarely correct…) Chances are that LeBron James will carry Cleveland to take one game. But I don’t think it will matter much. Golden State is stacked. The overindulgent signing of the great Kevin Durant in the off-season made the already incredible Warriors a near lock as this year’s champions. Handily winning every single playoff game may not make for great viewing, but it does make the Warriors rather impressive.

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Who Is the Greatest Theologian?

By Bob Hiller –

One of the great joys of the sports bar is what we might call the “greatness debate.” You know how it goes: “Who is the greatest point guard in the league right now?” “If you could start a franchise with three players in the league, who would you take?” “Give me your top five post-season quarterbacks after 1980.” Beer-induced passion sets in producing delightfully aimless arguments with no real answers. Everyone has a chance to flex their sports-trivia muscles and pile on the guys with the worst answers (a position I know all too well).

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Choppers and Plows and Preaching

By Paul Koch –

I had forgotten how much I love the radical freedom and danger of flying down the road on a stripped-down motorcycle. A bike only equipped with the necessary safety features—good brakes, new tires, and a headlight and tail light, lacking a horn, speedometer, front fender, chain guard, mufflers, turn indicators, and rear shocks is a simple and powerful machine. It doesn’t allow the distractions of the radio, text messages, or much else to get in the way. It’s just you and the wind in your face with all the sights, sounds, and smells of the journey you’re on.

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Call Day Extravaganza!

By Ross Engel –

This is an exciting week in the lives of the future pastors of the LCMS. Both of our synod’s seminaries hosted their annual call and vicarage placement services. These are anxious moments as fourth-year seminarians patiently wait through an evening Vespers service to find out where they will serve for their first Divine Call. Second-year students get to find out where they will be placed for their one year of vicarage (like a pastoral internship). The running joke has always been that calls and vicarage assignments are determined by the throw of a dart at a map of the USA, but I’ve been told that there is much more to the process.

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Know What You Are Talking About

By Bob Hiller –

The madness has arrived! As you read this, sixty-four of the nation’s best college basketball teams are playing in the most exciting tournament the American sports calendar has to offer. One of the best parts of the NCAA College basketball tournament is filling out a bracket with friends and co-workers and betting on who will pick the most winners. Though we are not gambling on it, a bunch of folks from my congregation have a pool going. Upon writing this blog, I am in the midst of filling out my bracket to win bragging rights for the year. There is just one problem: I haven’t got a single clue about any of these teams!

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Law, Gospel and Friendship

By Caleb Keith –

Dear Jagged Mafia,

I let the month of February get the best of me. I was bummed out by some pastoral harassment and overwhelmed by the beginning of a new semester. I let these two things feed into my natural laziness, but it’s time to shake off the slump. With that in mind, I thought it would be appropriate to highlight the last two episodes of the Thinking Fellows podcast. On these two fantastic shows, the fellows and I were joined by none other than the Jagged Word’s very own Pastor Koch. On recording day, we enjoyed fine whiskey and pipe smoke while talking about friendship and preaching the Law and the Gospel. I personally believe that these are some of the best episodes we have ever recorded.

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Where are You?

By Paul Koch –

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The creative and powerful word of God speaks into being all that we know. He says, “Let there be light,” and there was light. He separates the waters, causes dry land to appear, and brings forth all the vegetation of the earth. If that wasn’t enough, He sets into motion the sun, moon and stars. He establishes the wonders of heavens above. Then He turns to fill His creation with living creatures. Every snail, polar bear and fish in the deep of the ocean has its origin in the voice of God. It was all good. It was perfect. It was exactly what He intended it to be. God was the ultimate of artists, not using one substance to make another, but out of nothing He paints into existence a world that He loves.

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Don’t Preach about Christ – Preach Christ, Dangit!

By Scott Keith –

I am not a pastor. I also have a hard time staying in one place for a long time. As a result, I have spent the last several years visiting many different churches. The sad reality is that, even in the blessed LCMS, “the goods” are not always handed over on Sunday morning. By “the goods,” I mean to say that in my admittedly limited experience, Christ and Him crucified for the forgiveness of my sins is infrequently proclaimed to me at church.

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Good News in a Breaking News World

By Bob Hiller –

I doubt Eugene Peterson tweets. But, thank God, somebody has set up a Twitter account to share his genius with us every day! The other day, the Peterson tweeter sent out this thought provoking gem: “It is not difficult in such a world to get a person interested in…the gospel; it is terrifically difficult to sustain the interest.” Now every preacher of Christ’s Good News knows how true this is. It is not uncommon for pastors who emphasize grace to hear from a very well intentioned parishioner, “You know, preacher, we get that Jesus died to forgive our sins. But what now? Don’t you have something for us to do?” Peterson is right, it doesn’t take long for boredom with the gospel to set in.

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Ringside: Episode 18

Do you like long walks on the beach, puppies, hummus, the color light tan? Then you will absolutely hate Ringside! The preachers pour some light on some hot traxx! Topics: preaching in the age of Trump aint so easy, Why do Roman Catholics often receive only the host during communion? What’s the unforgivable sin exactly? Is Facebook dead? When can we revolt!? Is there a Christian dress-code? MLK’s awesome Street Sweeper speech! and more!!!

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The Foolishness of God

By Paul Koch –

I have had the privilege throughout my life to stand inside some beautiful and historic churches. I’ve been in the Castle Church in Wittenberg where Luther is buried and I’ve stood in the great Cathedral in Strasburg, France. I’ve been inside the church of the Nativity in Bethlehem and the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem. But to be honest, they all paled in comparison to entering into the great Hagia Sophia in modern Istanbul, Turkey. I don’t think my wife and I will ever forget wandering the massive halls of that structure. Adding to its impressive size and beauty is the fact that it was completed in 537 AD. It was rumored that when the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I entered it for the first time he muttered, “Solomon, I have surpassed you.” In other words, this building was more glorious than Solomon’s temple in Jerusalem. A structure like that helps us to lift our eyes heavenward, to behold the majesty of a God that would invite us into His presence. It was nothing short of glorious.

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Preaching: The Good, the Bad, and the Indifferent

By Paul Koch –

“But is it terrible everywhere?” My wife asked, interrupting me in the midst of my (almost weekly) tirade about the state of preaching in the church. Now that is a good question. Is preaching really all that poor in the churches or has that only been my experience? Or am I just too damn picky and overly critical of what I hear? While many may think that because I am a preacher I have more of a right than most to critique preaching, the truth is I don’t get out that often to hear preaching. As a friend in Georgia used to remind me, I live in a strange little Lutheran bubble.

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The Ears of Faith

By Paul Koch –

Throughout our lives, we have heard the old saying that “seeing is believing.” In order for us to believe in anything we need to verify its authenticity; we need to actually see it unfold or have some proof that it happened. However, more than ever we are finding that this is not so easy to come by. After Christmas I took my family out to go see the new Star Wars movie. In that movie we saw ships jump to hyperspace, laser blasts destroy the enemy, and a space station the size of a small moon. If all that wasn’t enough we even watched as actors that have been dead now for many years were brought back to life and performed on the big screen. Seeing was not believing. With the amazing advancement in computer graphics, the suspension of disbelief has gone far beyond the movie magic of days gone by.

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Certain of the Call

By Bob Hiller –

How does one know that they are saved? Where can the Christian turn for any ground of certainty before God on Judgment Day? As a pastor, these questions are often found in the fear-filled voices of guilt-ridden Christians in my study. Lead a Bible study on Romans 9-11 sometime and watch fear fill the eyes as folks realize God is actually, actually, sovereign over salvation. If He loved Jacob and hated Esau, what hope do I have that my love for stew isn’t going to be the end of me? Bring up the fate of Judas in a class and see if anyone who has any semblance of their role in the death of Christ is feeling comfortable about their standing before God. Passages like these, coupled with an awareness of our sin and God’s Law, tend to shake the confidence of God’s people. So, is there certainty for our faith? Where can we turn?

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Atmospheric Pressure

By Paul Koch –

I was at a meeting with a group of my colleagues the other day in which we had a lengthy discussion on worship trends and practices in our various congregations. This conversation moved (as it usually does) to a critique of practices that are not inherit in our particular tradition but have been borrowed and adapted from other theological confessions. We were discussing how we weigh and analyze their worth and impact and how they have influenced the expectations of those who gather together for worship on a Sunday morning. 

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The Wussification of the American Pulpit

By Paul Koch –

Now, with a title like that, you might be thinking that I’m going to ramble on about the lack of masculinity among the members of my own vocation. And you would be right, but not necessarily in the way you are thinking. To be sure, there is fertile ground in making fun of the so-called bravery of the theological-thought police on Facebook (or so I’m told), and who doesn’t love a well-timed and well-aimed rant about the ivory tower theologians that plague genuine proclamation? However, my focus here is on the very attitude and way in which a pastor speaks. To put it simply, more and more pastors today sound like a bunch of wussies.

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Looking for Another

By Paul Koch –

We all know who John the Baptist was. We know that he was the great forerunner of our Lord Jesus Christ. He was the voice of one crying in the wilderness, “Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.” He was that bridge between the Old Testament prophecies about the one who would come to execute justice and righteousness in the land. John not only baptized our Lord in the Jordan River but he saw the heavens tear open as the Spirit descended upon him like a dove. He was the one who pointed all who came to him, not to himself but to Jesus Christ and declared, “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.” John the Baptist has a featured place in all four of the Gospel accounts as he preached, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”

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Bored with Preaching

By Bob Hiller –

Somewhere along the way, I was taught that sermons should always be about Jesus. Further into my training, I learned that this doesn’t just mean that we should talk about what Jesus did a long time ago, but that what Jesus did a long time ago is for you here and now. The proclamation of the Good News (that is, the Gospel) is not simply an explanation of sacred events, but the delivering of sacred gifts, which in itself is a sacred event. Preaching is delivering Jesus to sinners and attacking those things that try to get in His way. At least it should be. At least, that is what I was taught.

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