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In This Issue:
A-Caroling We Go!
• David’s House • Church Universal, Church Triumphant...Church Relevant? • Seven Steps to Staying Sane During the Holidays
www
. h i g h e r t h i n g s . o r g / WINTER / 2 0 1 4
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Cross train your brain.
“The Core really made me think outside of the box and forced me to answer difficult questions, not accepting an “I don’t know” or “I don’t care” answer. It involved a lot of connection-making, which really helped me articulate my responses to difficult questions.”
Education should strengthen your brain, challenge you to ask questions, and build a strong foundation for your future. In Concordia University Irvine’s *nationally recognized Core curriculum, you will learn about God and service to the world through the cross of Christ. You will cross disciplinary boundaries by studying biology with theology, mathematics with philosophy, and history with literature. You will wrestle with questions and concepts of life that have endured across the centuries. You will cultivate sound academic habits and skills that apply across the curriculum, to your future careers, and life. Exercise your mind. Exercise your faith. Cross train your brain. H I G H E R T H I N G S __ 2
*Concordia University Irvine is a member of the Association for Core Texts and Courses’ Liberal Arts Institute. This prestigious institute— composed of 12 universities that include Columbia, St. John’s, Pepperdine, and Notre Dame—promotes “the integrated and common study of world classics and texts of major cultural significance” in general education programs across North America.
www.cui.edu/core
Scan here to learn more about the Core.
Contents T A B L E O F
Volume 14/Number 4 • Winter 2014
By Rev. George F. Borghardt Don’t worry about donning your beanies or slipping on your mittens to go a-caroling. All you need to do is embark on a frolicking read through Rev. Borghardt’s joyous reminders of Jesus during this Christmas season.
6 David’s House
By Rev. Mark Buetow “The new is in the old concealed; the old is in the new revealed,” is an ancient maxim about the Old and New Testaments attributed to church father, Augustine. Rev. Buetow highlights this insightful saying by illustrating the amazing connection between David, King of Israel and Jesus.
8 Church Universal, Church Triumphant… Church Relevant?
By Kelly Klages Universal, triumphant, invisible. These are just a few of the historically grounded adjectives that describe God’s church. Now “relevant” seems to be the latest trending descriptive, but what’s wrong with a church trying to be relevant? Kelly examines why this is a dangerous path for the church to take.
10 Seven Steps to Staying Sane During the Holidays
By Rev. Todd A. Peperkorn You don’t have to chronically suffer from depression in order for the holidays to drag you down. Regardless, sometimes the blues can catch you by surprise. With a blend of humor and empathy, Rev. Peperkorn lists out some ways to keep your balance during the holiday craziness.
12 The Satisfying Assessment of James Sire: Why Worldviews Matter Seven Apologists Every Christian Should Know, Pt. 3 By Rev. Mark A. Pierson In this third part of his apologetics series, Rev. Pierson profiles Christian author James Sire, who has a knack for understanding worldviews and teaching others to decode them. You’ll soon discover why Sire is a vital part of your apologetics repertoire.
14 The Walking Dead
By Rev. Dave Haberstock Zombies…they’re everywhere…but that’s only in cable TV series and at the nearest Comic Con, right? Well, think again. The reality is we are all dead people who think we’re alive, and the only solution to the apocalyptic madness, as Rev. Haberstock explains, is Christ alone.
®
Volume 14/Number 4/Winter 2014
Special Features 4 A-Caroling We Go
HigherThings
20 Considering the Vocation of Military Service
By Kay Maiwald Have you decided yet what direction you might want to go for your career? Luther believed the vocation of soldier is a noble and honorable profession for a Christian. As Kay looks at Luther’s perspective, she brings to bear her own experience as the mother of two servicemen.
22 Let It Go: Your Identity in Christ Trumps Your GPA
By Ramona Tausz There’s a lot of pressure in academic circles to make the grade, to stand out, to be exceptional. It can become far too easy to let your GPA become your primary focus. Ramona examines the fine line between pursuing excellence and succumbing to idolatry and reminds us that ultimately it’s Jesus and Him crucified in which we have our identity.
Bible Studies for these articles can be found at: higherthings.org/ magazine/biblestudies.html Editor
Katie Hill Art Director
Steve Blakey Editorial Associates
Rev. Greg Alm s Rev. Paul Beisel Rev. Bart Day Copy Editors
Lu Fischer Dana Niem i Bible Study Authors
Rev. Mark Buetow Rev. Jacob Ehrhard Rev. Sam uel Schuldheisz Subscriptions Manager
Elizab eth Carlson IT Assistant
24 The Return of the King
By Dr. Joshua T. Mears Professional sports appeals to many of us because in a way it satisfies our need to rally behind a hero. NBA basketball is no different. Joshua shows that as exciting as LeBron James can be to follow, he will always fall short when compared to the person and work of the true King, Jesus Christ.
Jon Kohlm eier ___________
Board of Directors President
Rev. George Borghardt Vice-President
Rev. Dr. Carl Fickenscher Treasurer
Regular Features 18 HT 2015 Conferences Te Deum Registration Details!
28 Catechism Intro to the Small Catechism
By Rev. William M. Cwirla Now is the perfect time to pull your Small Catechism from the shelf, blow off the dust, and rediscover its value. Before Rev. Cwirla delves into even more Catechism goodness, he lays out its origin and development and why it is the essential tool for nurturing our faith.
30 Bible Study David’s House
Be sure to check out this sample of one of our student Bible studies which links up with Rev. Buetow’s article on P. 6.
Chris Loem ker Secretary
Rev. Joel Fritsche Rev. Brent Kuhlm an Eric Maiw ald Sue Pellegrini Matt Phillips Rev. Chris Rosebrough ___________
Executive Council Deputy Executive/Media
Rev. Mark Buetow Conference and Retreats Executive
Sandra Ostap ow ich Business Executive
Connie Bram m eier Technology Executive
Stan Lem on
Higher Things® Magazine ISSN 1539-8455 is published quarterly by Higher Things, Inc., PO Box 156, Sheridan, WY 82801. No portion of this publication may be reproduced without the written consent of the executive editor of Higher Things Magazine. Copyright 2014. Higher Things® and Christ on Campus® are registered trademarks of Higher Things Inc.; All Rights Reserved. Printed in the United States. Postage paid at St. Louis, Missouri. For subscription information and questions, call 1-888-4826630, then press 4, or e-mail subscriptions@higherthings.org. (This phone number is only used for subscription queries.) For letters to the editor, write letters@higher things.org. Writers may submit manuscripts to: submissions@ higherthings.org. Please check higherthings.org/magazine/ writers.html for writers’ guidelines and theme lists.
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Church Universal, Church Triumphant...
Church Relevant? By Kelly Klages
T
H I G H E R T H I N G S __ 8
hese days, news items seem to come out weekly about apparently conservative Christian groups making concessions to leftist social values and paradigms. This fall, for example, Hillsong pastors Brian Houston and Carl Lentz famously evaded condemnation of gay marriage, speaking instead of “being in conversation with people” and “not wanting to tell them how to live on their own journey.” What’s going on here? I would propose that this is not just a case of people going from right to left. What the American church has called “conservative” for so many years, though it may have been socially or politically conservative, has actually been underpinned with theological liberalism from the very beginning. It’s good for Lutherans to be aware of these trends so we can watch out for those things which would pull us away from a real Savior who rescues us from our real sins. Here are some examples...
Law/Gospel confusion. A common denominator, universal to people of every stripe, is the disappearance of the centrality of the Gospel. We used to associate “love is all you need” with a more left-wing dismissal of doctrine and objective truth in favor of “love.” But it is just as common to hear Christians of a more conservative type say that the most important and defining teaching of Christianity is “love God and love your neighbor.” Such
an emphasis on the Law may result in sermon after sermon on personal betterment and moral transformation, or it may result in a focus on social justice issues or environmentalism. It’s ultimately the same. Evangelicals who are disillusioned with moral navelgazing do not have far to go to find the “emergent” or “emerging” church emphasis on social and global issues. In both cases, the true Gospel does not seem particularly central to their faith.
baptizing. Once such conservative Christians notice that the passage does not talk about sharing your personal testimony or going on mission trips, but rather involves pastoral teaching and baptizing, they may naturally assume that all believers should therefore be able to be ordained. And if you’re not okay with that (as the reasoning goes), then you obviously don’t care about all those people going to hell, ergo, you’re not mission‑minded!
Pragmatism and “mission” by any means possible. In more conservative circles, an emphasis on the church’s mission had long been tempered by the desire to remain faithful to the Word. Charles Finney’s 19th‑century revivalism and its successor, the Church Growth Movement, began changing that. New measures were employed in the American church with the question, “Is it fit to convert sinners with? Does it work?” The big tents went up, the popular and dynamic speakers were chosen, and sensationalism reigned. Self-proclaimed conservative Christians began with the idea that the church’s job is to get everyone into heaven and out of hell; over time, such an important mission would be seen as something that the church could try to use any means possible to accomplish. The acceptance of women’s ordination is a good example of where “mission at all cost” can lead. Church groups like Bill Hybel’s Willow Creek Association began to question Scripture’s teaching on women’s ordination, eventually rejecting it. After all (pragmatically speaking), if women have certain talents and the goal is to get people out of hell, any means possible is best if it works, right? Conservative evangelicals came up with spiritual gifts inventories a few decades ago; who is anyone to tell me that I can’t use whatever gifts and talents that I am successful with to serve the greater good? Today, it’s not uncommon to find women raised in morally conservative churches using Matthew 28 as justification for the idea that all believers are called to be “ministers,” including preaching and
“Just me and my Bible”: hardcore individualism and autonomy. In the past it was called soul liberty or individual freedom, a casting off of church hierarchy and creeds. Americans came to love it. If you are sitting alone with your Bible and you think that God is speaking to your heart, and you’ve got no particular confession of faith to which you’ve subscribed, then the Bible can become putty in your hands. Whatever you “feel called to do”— validated by positive circumstances around you that seem to affirm whatever it is you’ve decided you want to do—is sufficient for knowing truth. Subjective relativism is not far behind, and you can even call it “biblical!” The glorification of the will. In North America, forging your own spiritual destiny found fertile ground and remains an important component of both political and Christian “conservative” values. You choose your life path, pull yourself up by your bootstraps, and are responsible for how transformed and successful your life is. It’s not hard to draw a direct line between this and the liberal mindset that values “choice” above all (as heard in the rallying cry of the pro‑abortionists). The glorification of the will is strong in the Old Adam, regardless of political affiliation. I once read an article by a liberal Baptist pastor who spoke of his acceptance of homosexuality as a lifestyle. His rationale? The teaching of the age of accountability! If it might be demonstrated that homosexuals (like infants) don’t really have a choice, they can’t be held accountable, he thought.
Even many conservative Baptists have taught that it just wouldn’t be fair of God to condemn infants who don’t have a choice and can’t make a decision. Similarly, a growing trend among even conservative, missionminded Christians is that we can’t assume that those in far-off lands who haven’t heard and received the Gospel in faith are really condemned, because choice is everything. A fear of being irrelevant or out-ofstep with the culture. Evangelicalism practically began, in the 20th century, with a desire for cultural relevance. Just like any progressivist movement, it envisioned world-transforming power, clamored after the next Big Thing, scorned Christianity’s link with tradition and the past, and mocked those who resisted change. But over time, fear of irrelevancy inevitably caused many Evangelicals to make more and more concessions. Christians who had always self-identified as conservative were being pulled along by their progressivist culture more than they’d realized. The reality is that whenever the Law is the dominant force in the church, it turns into a celebration of the human will and its accomplishments, and a wagging finger against those who don’t measure up to the list of culturally‑accepted dos and don’ts. The solution is a Law that kills, that exposes our true depravity and helplessness, and a Jesus who does not merely help and inspire but who lives, dies, and rises for the forgiveness of sins and our salvation—the Gospel. The world will do what it wants. And Jesus will do what He wants, which is to continue to save sinners by crucifying the Old Adam and raising to life a new man in Christ. Kelly Klages lives in Morden, Manitoba with her husband Alex and their three children. She is the author of Water with the Word: A Baptism Q&A and Hosanna, Loud Hosanna: Illustrated Hymns for Children.
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The
Walking Dead By Rev. Dave Haberstock
H I G H E R T H I N G S __ 14
Zombies
are everywhere these days: in video games, movies, TV shows, yes, even in my Catechism classes. But one of the most popular locations of all is AMC’s “The Walking Dead.” Zombies are so popular because they teach us a truth that the Law written on our hearts confesses to us at almost every moment of our lives, which is...
You are a zombie–a “Walking Dead” zombie to be exact. In that fictional universe the zombies don’t just eat brains. They eat the living. They devour the flesh of anything that moves and breathes, especially and primarily human beings, in whom is the breath of life, the breath of God. All human beings in the “Walking Dead” universe are infected with the virus or disease that causes zombie-ism. When they die, they turn. Everyone in that universe is one of the walking dead. Many of the living give up and choose to become zombies. Many of the living are already zombie-like predators, preying upon the living, killing to “stay alive.” Some even eat the herd, hunt, and BBQ the living for food. To be alive in that world is already to be a zombie. Nor does it seem to matter how you live, because the worst always comes out in you, as that harsh realm always robs you of virtuous choices, reducing every situation to a catch 22: Kill or be killed. Every meaningful exchange in that world becomes a discussion about whether you can “come back” from what you’ve had to do. They are already dead—dead in sins and transgressions; alive, but merely waiting to become what they already know they are.
through the skull of Golgotha, by a Heel smashing the undead nerve endings in that zombie-snake mind. That undead zombie-snake bit that Heel. It infected that Heel with death. ‘Twas just a flesh wound, but it caused death in the flesh of that Man: Jesus Christ. He ought to have turned zombie Himself, except for two facts: He’d already crushed death, and all its works and all its ways, and His flesh is incorruptible, indestructible. Though it dies, it lives! And it gives life to zombies. You are a zombie, already limping around like an undead thing, seeking to devour the living. But this Living One gives His flesh to be eaten by zombies. And lo and behold, the zombies live! Their color improves. Their desire for a pound of flesh wanes, for they are no longer zombies. They are now men, trapped in the flesh of a zombie. This living flesh of Jesus gives life to both the living and the dead. But like so many bad horror movies, the unnatural evil comes back, sequel after awful sequel. So this Ninja of Ninjas Living One gives His living flesh to the flesh eaters. It slays them and makes alive. They still have corruptible bodies. Decaying bodies. Bodies that will betray them and turn on their loved ones in a moment’s notice. But this Man’s flesh is both the cure and the promise. It slays zombies and raises men, living men, on this side of eternity. But it does not fully deliver that promise yet. The fullness of that life is yet to come. g a.or
You are a zombie. The sin nature you were born with has predetermined that you are a zombie, preying upon the “living”, never able to make up for the choices you’ve made—the things you can’t help but do. It is a fact of your birth. Photo : cove nantchattanoog You are already infected. It is what you are. Even while you are “alive” your actions will hardly You are a zombie. But that is good. For you are be better than the mindless, undead zombies that also a living being, given life by the Living One, seek to kill you. You cry out, “But I’m a human being, Jesus Christ. Whenever your zombie nature raises with the ability to love and choose.” But that is false. its ugly head, that merely drives you back to the Your “love” is ultimately for yourself, not for others. Living One. To His life. To His boot heel that crushes Self-love is not real love. Real love is turned outward down sin and Satan under our feet. To His Water and toward God and your neighbor. Self-love is turned Word which wash you clean of corruption. To His inward. You are your own idol. And you do not freely double-edged sword which gave and gives you life. “choose.” Your nature chooses for you. Zombies In the “Walking Dead,” the living can look forward do what zombies do. They may “choose” to eat this to nothing other than becoming the walking dead. human or that human, but it’s all still determined by But in this life, you look forward in Jesus to one day the zombie nature. Even though you are not fully having death put down once for all and being able zombie but “alive” you do not choose what is good, to live forever with Him. Jesus, whose flesh is the but only what is easy, expedient, or “necessary.” cure for zombie-ism, is the One who will someday The only way to deal with your zombie state is turn your “Zombieland” into His Promised Land. to die to it. A head shot. A crushing blow. From a gun, sword, sharp stick, bat, or the heel of a boot Rev. Dave Haberstock is the pastor of crushing the skull of the snake, I mean, zombie. Epiphany Lutheran Church in Thunder That is you. You must die. Die to sin. Die to self. Bay, Ontario. He can be reached at Die to Satan, whose power was crushed by a stake pastorh@tbaytel.net.
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