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What's New at Lutheran Forum
The First Annual Lutheran Forum Theological Reading Challenge!
We at Lutheran Forum are committed to reading as an essential part of our spiritual growth—that's one of the reasons Luther translated the Bible into the vernacular. But the frenetic pace of life today, even in the midst of our congregations, encourages only skimming and quick dips into the shallow end of the theological pond. So we invite all those who want to reclaim religious reading as a way of life to join us! Commit yourself to reading this set of texts over the course of 2013. There are just enough to be a challenge, but not too many to be impossible to fit into a busy modern life...
Scandinavian Theology, the Two Kingdoms, and Karl Barth's First Ecumenical Meeting
In the spring 2013 issue, Maria E. Erling reviews the ways in which Scandinavian theology in the mid-twentieth-century mediated Luther afresh to American Lutherans, who were looking for a new way forward after the crisis of German Lutheranism during the Second World War. Scandinavian Luther research was also helpful for disputes within Europe. The following article, originally published in Swedish and translated by Erling, “From the Contemporary Theological Context,” Svenskt Teologisk Kvartalskrift 23/1 (January 1947), reports on a World Council of Churches meeting in 1947 that led to improved understanding between Lutherans and Reformed on the subject of Luther’s “two kingdoms” doctrine. It was also the first ecumenical meeting that Karl Barth ever attended! The article ends with the seven theses jointly agreed upon by both Lutherans and Reformed...
Review of "From Willow Creek to Sacred Heart" by Chris Haw
The author Chris Haw is part of a loose phenomenon known as the New Monastics. The outward appearance of the new monastics boils down to privileged young white evangelicals moving into intentional communities in economically devastated sections of older cities and attempting to live not under the older monastic imperatives of poverty, chastity and obedience but under a more progressive banner of justice and prophetic living. If you just read the names of who blurbed From Willow Creek to Sacred Heart you might be forgiven for immediately jumping to the conclusion that this is the latest offering from what used to be called the emerging church. Or, only reading Willow Creek in the title you might immediate assume it is the latest offering from the American evangelical publishing industry breathlessly proclaiming the new world-changing read. Normally I would have counted three strikes and called the book out. That umpire needs to get his reading glasses because From Willow Creek to Sacred Heart can’t be judged by its cover. There are many parts that make a Lutheran wince, but the overall read is much preferable to any of those cover assumptions and would make great source material for a study group...
Prayers for Lent and Easter (C)
Richard Bansemer, former Bishop of the Virginia Synod of the ELCA, and author of the ALPB's devotional books O Lord, Teach Me to Pray based on the Small Catechism, and We Believe based on the Augsburg Confession, has graciously provided prayers of the church for the Lent and Easter seasons, series C. All of the prayers reflect the lessons of the day...
Come, Lord Jesus
It is entirely rational to be fearful, of nearly everything and nearly all the time, and that is one of the biggest problems with fear. There’s simply no end to it. Wars sprout and grow all over the globe, and there is no guarantee that we will end our days without seeing another on our own soil. In the meanwhile, as recent tragic events have demonstrated once again, there is no immunity from terrorizing violence even in apparently peaceful lands and towns. We fear the state of the economy, the state of the government, and the state of the church; we fear for the health of our food and the health of our environment. We fear the people around us and we fear for them. All too often our fears our justified, and so it is proven to us, once again, how eminently rational it is to live in a state of constant fear...