Sermon on Hebrews 9:24-28
IT ONLY TAKES ONE… One sacrifice of Jesus to do away with sin One appearance of Jesus to deliver us salvation Text: Hebrews 9:24-28 Introduction My father-in-law has a saying about home improvement projects: “Every home improvement project requires at least three trips to Home Depot.”  If you’ve ever tackled one of those projects around your home, you know what I mean.  About a year or so ago, one of the church council membe

Sermon for All Saints’ Day
WHAT MAKES A SAINT A SAINT? Text: Revelation 7:9-10,13-14 I. Three years ago, I was enrolled in a liturgy class at Santa Clara University that required me to visit a “festival occasion” service at another church and then write a report about the service.  I decided to check out a local Catholic Mass on All Saints’ Day evening, since All Saints’ Day is supposed to be as big of a deal for Catholic churches as Reformation services are in Lutheran churches.  But what struck me most abou

Reformation Reflections
During last week’s WELS Arizona-California District pastors’ conference, our district president, Pastor Jon Buchholz (Tempe, AZ), began his report with some thoughts about the Lutheran Reformation and its theology.  On this Reformation Day, I thought I’d share with you what he shared with us in his report: Then I saw another angel flying in midair, and he had the eternal gospel to proclaim to those who live on the earth—to every nation, tribe, language and people. He said in a loud voice, “Fear God and give him glory, because the hour of his judgment has come. Worship him who made the heav

Neither Papistic nor Karlstadtian
Yesterday (Tuesday, October 20, 2009), I presented an essay to the WELS Arizona-California District Pastors’ Conference at St. Paul’s First Lutheran Church in North Hollywood, CA.  The essay was titled, “Neither Papistic nor Karlstadtian: Luther’s Principles of Adiaphora Applied to the Liturgical Life of the Church.”  I’ll have more comments about the paper that I’ll add in the days to come, but I thought I’d post the paper online for you to read if you’d like to check it out.

Sermon on Mark 10:2-9
A MATCH MADE IN HEAVEN Text: Mark 10:2-9 This month, Kelly Hildebrandt is getting married to Kelly Hildebrandt.  Yes, you heard that correctly.  No, it’s not some narcissistic joke; she’s not marrying herself.  Kelly Katrina Hildebrandt, age 20, will be getting married to Kelly Carl Hildebrandt, age 24.  Kelly, a young woman from Florida, was bored one night, decided to go online, and searched on Facebook to see if there was anyone else who had her same name.  Lo and behold, she found Kelly, a young man from Texas who