Letters On The Page

One of my favorite authors is Wendell Berry. He is a Kentucky farmer and writer. He has written a number of short stories and books that center around the fictional small town of Port William. A personal favorite from his fiction is Jayber Crow .  If I was in a position to do so, I would make every Pastor of smaller communities read Jayber Crow.  The book and character of Jayber Crow offers wisdom. I have used two of his short stories from the collection Watch with Me in Bible studies and presentations. In his fiction, Berry presents characters that are recognizable and normal human beings who live through love, heartbreak, and death. As Port William is in rural Kentucky, Berry writes of the agricultural shifts and challenges that have materialized with the development of industrialized and mechanized farming.  Berry is also a poet and essay writer.  Perhaps the most anthologized poem is  Manifesto: Mad Farmer Liberation Front . His essays focus primarily on ag...

Video of service at St. Luke, Rensselaer 2024 Pentecost 19 Numbers 11:4-6, 10-16, 24-29             James 5:1-20                   Mark 9:38-50 Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer. Amen. In the course of our three-year lectionary, the book of Numbers is only used three times. Numbers 6 and 21 are the other two readings. So, I offer a quick overview of the book of Numbers because even in our devotional readings, I suspect we may not draw deeply from this particular book.  The book of Numbers is the fourth book of the Old Testament and is a part of the Old Testament we call the Pentateuch. The Pentateuch is the first five books of the Bible. They are written by the prophet and law-giver Moses. The book of Numbers records the travels of Israel from Mount Si...

Video of Divine Service   2024 Pentecost 18   Jeremiah 11:18-20         James 3:13-4:10     Mark 9:30-37 Questions Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer. Amen.  Questions are asked in today’s texts.  The questions lead us to reflect upon the humanity of the disciples as well as our own motives, attitudes, and behaviors. These reflections lead us to seek God’s help, specifically, His help through the cross of Jesus Christ.   The first question is from James: “ Who is wise and understanding among you? ”  My thinking is that if any of us leaps up and says, “Yes sir! That’s me, at your service!” Perhaps that individual ought to sit down and wait for what comes next. The Holy Spirit may very well stir our ears and heart so that we hear this as an accusation. Pride makes us think we are wiser than what we real...

Video of Divine Service at St. Luke, Rensselaer 2024 Pentecost 17          Isaiah 50:4-10        James 3:1-12          Mark 9:14-29   Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer. Amen.   Some of you may have heard that Pastor Martin Luther, esteemed Doctor of Scripture at Wittenberg University, has stated in print, that the Letter of James is as straw. He first wrote this in the 1522 Preface to the New Testament. His analogy has been taken out of context and from time to time it has taken on a life of its own. The 2009 Lutheran Study Bible has a useful introduction to the Epistle of James that also addresses the “straw” analogy. It says, “ The statements derive from Luther’s frustration with opponents who used James 2 to attack what Luther had learned about justification and sanctification while caref...

Image address for James, writer of the Epistle Video for Service and Sermon at St. Luke, Rensselaer 2024 Pentecost 16 Isaiah 35:4-7a                 James 2:1-10, 14-18                           Mark 7:24-37   Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer. Amen.    “ Show no partiality ” James says. In other words, do not show favoritism for one person over another. The example he gives makes clear that James is not telling people to be polite. He is addressing an issue where one person, based on outward appearances, is elevated to a special status in the congregation while another is judged harshly and then treated in a dismissive manner.   I have no doubt that James is writing under the inspirat...

 Friends,   Beginning Sunday, September 8... The Divine Service at St. Luke Ev. Lutheran Church, Rensselaer, IN begins at 8am. The Divine Service at The Lutheran Church of Our Saviour, Monticello, IN begins at 11:30am. God bless!

“I lift up my eyes” I remember the first time I experienced Psalm 121outside of church or devotional reading. I was in the audience watching a play based on the Diary of Anne Frank. Anne and her family were hiding in the attic of a Christian home during the dark days of Nazi rule in Germany. Anyone deemed Jewish, regardless of their personal belief, was systematically hunted, forced into ghettos, and when taken to prison camps, annihilated. The Nazis created fear and out of fear people cooperated with them.  In the play, there was a climactic moment of great distress when several things came to a head. Anne’s mother looks up to the heavens and prays the first lines of Psalm 121: “ I lift up my eyes to the hills, from where does my help come? My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth .”   That scene often comes back to me. The Frank family was a praying family before. But, when they are at their wits end and mortal danger is coming with no escape possible, wha...

  Video of Service at St. Luke, Rensselaer    Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost Deuteronomy 4:1-2, 6-9            Ephesians 6:10-20                    Mark 7:14-23 Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight O Lord, my rock and my redeemer. Amen.  Right around 1000 BC, Jesse of Bethlehem sent his youngest son David to Israel’s army camp in order to deliver food to Jesse’s three eldest sons. The brothers had followed King Saul to fight the Philistines. The battle was at a lull and daily a ferocious, giant, beast of a man in the Philistine camp came out to taunt Israel. He called upon Israel to send out a man to fight him. The winner takes all.  David heard this giant bellow and offered to fight. Even though David was not in the army, nor was he a soldier, but still very much a...