FINDING AND LOSING YOUR LIFE

The day the police first entered the house, they did not even notice that the floor had collapsed, because all they saw was ceiling-high clutter along the walls and waist-high clutter in other areas. It was not until the next day that officials discovered that the floor had caved in. After making sure that the building was safe to enter, officials cut a hole in one of the walls and then began removing debris with a backhoe. It was not until the next day that they found the woman’s body. She had been killed by and was buried underneath all of her stuff.

What a horrible way to die. To be killed by and then buried underneath all of your stuff. And yet isn’t that exactly what happens to so many people spiritually? They are first killed by and then they are buried underneath all of their stuff.

What is the purpose of an apple? Not just to produce another apple, or even just an apple tree. Rather the purpose of an apple is to produce a whole orchard of apple trees. Every apple has within itself the ability – the resources – to begin a process that eventually can produce a whole new orchard of apple trees.

If Jesus had not gone the way of the cross and died, there would be only one seed. Because He died, there is a whole new orchard. We – the Church – are the result of His surrendered life.

And in Matthew 10: 39 Jesus applies the same principle to us, when He says, “Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.”

What does it mean to lose your life? It means going through the daily grind. Getting up in the morning and doing whatever you do during the day. It means basically living your life for yourself, keeping all your discretionary time for yourself, and spending all or most of your discretionary money on yourself. It means surrounding yourself with a lot of stuff.

What does it mean to find your life? It means being like Jesus, who gave His life. But it is going to cost you something to do that. It will cost you the death of your own self-centered life. In one sense it will cost you everything. But in another sense it will cost you nothing. For loves does not think or talk about cost.

LETTER FROM THE DIRECTOR – JUNE 2017

Dear Friends of Lutheran CORE –

The June 2017 letter from the director will be in two parts. This first part is coming to you as we anticipate the summit on pastoral formation, which is only a week away. You will receive the second part after the summit, as we share with you ways in which God blessed our time together.

A week from today, June 21, the board of Lutheran CORE will be gathering at Grand View University in Des Moines with ten invited participants from four different Lutheran church bodies to wrestle with the question –

How can we best raise up, nurture, and support a whole new generation of Lutheran pastors who will be Biblical and confessional in their theology and evangelistic/outreach-oriented in their perspective and practice?

We are very grateful to all the friends of Lutheran CORE who are praying for the gathering. We also wish to thank all those who have given a gift in support of this event.

On the day of the summit we will be distributing information about the summit through posts on the blog on the home page of our website, www.lutherancore.org. Each blog post will then go out on Facebook and Twitter, so that you will be able to follow the progress of the discussions. Also, a member of our board will be recording the audio and posting it as a podcast on his blog. A blog post on our website will then be created, which will have a link to the audio post on his website. Please join us through electronic media and follow along with the discussions as they take place on the day of the summit.

Recent events have convinced me even more of the importance of this gathering. Every orthodox Lutheran should be alarmed over the movement that has risen out of the student body at the Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago. Taking the name “We Are Naked and Unashamed,” this group rejects marriage by any definition as normative for sexual relationships. There are some who would dismiss our concerns by saying, “It is only a group of seminarians who are promoting this.” We would respond, “But the list of signers also includes many pastors and other ELCA leaders.” And even if it were only a group of seminarians, just the fact that so many seminarians are advocating for ELCA approval of sexual intimacy and cohabitation outside of marriage should cause great concern for the future of the church. And the fact that we are not aware of any statement from the administration of the seminary, the Council of Bishops, and/or Presiding Bishop Elizabeth Eaton rejecting this movement should also cause great concern. A link to the website of the movement can be found here (LINK), while a link to Lutheran CORE’s response can be found here (LINK).

If that were not enough, a recent letter from the president-elect of United Lutheran Seminary, formed by the merger of the ELCA seminaries in Philadelphia and Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, should also raise concerns.

Now I for one am all in favor of peacemaking, nonviolence, and standing in solidarity with those who suffer under oppressive systems and structures. I totally agree that what we believe must impact what we do and how we live for our witness to have any credibility. But I know that when I personally entered seminary, I did not know the Bible and the Lutheran confessions well enough so that I did not need a seminary that would teach me the Scriptures and how the great Lutheran theological writings help me to understand the Scriptures. Also, during the forty years that I served as pastor of a congregation, I needed a whole range of skills beyond peacemaking, nonviolence, and cultural competency.

I think of the apostle Paul and his letters to churches. Even more so as Paul was reaching out to the Greco-Roman world, he was encountering people who did not have any idea at all of the story of God’s accomplishing His great work of salvation through the history of the nation of Israel and the birth, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. So in his preaching and letter writing he first had to teach the people the basic essentials of the Christian faith. Typically in his letters he spends the first half or so talking about what is true, what we should believe, and what God has done, and then the second half talking about what is right, how we should live, and what we should do.

If we lived in a day when everybody – all members of churches, all people whom our congregations are seeking to reach, all seminary students, and even everyone anticipating attending seminary – already knew the Bible and the Lutheran confessions, it would make sense to focus seminary education on peacemaking, nonviolence, and cultural competency. But in a day when most people do not know the basics of our faith, and members of our churches and even many people preparing for seminary, have only a limited knowledge of the Bible and the Lutheran confessions, then seminary education needs a different focus.

We certainly pray for Dr. Latini as she begins her work as president of United Lutheran Seminary. And we also pray for the leadership, faculty, and student body of every one of the Lutheran seminaries. But we also pray that God will use the upcoming summit on pastoral formation to begin a new movement of raising up pastors who know, love, value, believe, and obey the Bible and who are committed to helping people come into a faith relationship with Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord.

Blessings in Christ,

Dennis D. Nelson

President of the Board and Director of Lutheran CORE

909-274-8591

dennisdnelsonaz@yahoo.com