The Word at Work Winter 2020 In The Bleak Midwinter

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Letter From The Editor

Rooted and grounded in love... – Ephesians 3:17 ESV

“In the bleak midwinter.” This is the title of a Christmas song by Christina Rosetti (1830-1894) and appropriate for this time of the year. Rosetti speaks of Christ’s entrance into the world in a time of apparent hopelessness: “Earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone.” What a marvelous image of Christmas.

While we are currently in a literal bleak midwinter, I turn my thoughts to the coming spring, which will be a time of growth and renewal. As I do, I am reminded of something meaningful from a few years ago that I wanted to share. In the spring of 2013, my wife and I were new parents. Our son was almost 18 months old and had a difficult beginning to life. After he began consuming solid foods, he began to look sickly and often refused to eat. He was also not growing. He was hospitalized twice for respiratory viruses in the span of two months. We felt hopeless, but we both spent much time in prayer.

With the help of excellent physicians, we discovered that he had Celiac Disease, meaning that he was allergic to gluten. Once we implemented the gluten-free diet, it is amazing how quickly he began to thrive. We were so grateful to God for providing us with answers and for “daily bread” in the form of competent professionals and caring friends and neighbors.

Coinciding with my son’s health struggle, I came into possession of a box of donated used books. As I sorted through them, there were among the other books two worn-out Bibles. The spines had deteriorated, and the pages were falling out. But I noticed that these Bibles were well-used. Verses were underlined throughout. I was reminded of the saying, “A Bible that is falling apart usually belongs to someone who isn’t.”

But I was in a dilemma. What should I do with these worn-out Bibles? How we treat sacred things communicates to others the value we place on them, and I did not want to throw them in the trash. We are taught to treat any leftover bread and wine from the Lord’s Supper in a

respectful manner. Should the same principle not apply to the printed text of the Bible?

I got an idea. I deduced that the best way to dispose of a worn-out Bible is to bury it. Yet I felt that more could be done to make that action meaningful. On my son’s 18-month birthday, I went to a nearby nursery and purchased two tiny pine trees. In gratitude for our son’s life, health, and growth, I dug two holes in our yard. I placed a worn-out Bible near the roots of each one. In theory, as these trees grow, they could be used to produce the material to make a new Bible. But more than that, these trees became for us a symbol of being rooted in God’s promise to the world in Jesus Christ. They remain a reminder to be thankful that our son is and indeed all of us are “rooted and grounded in love,” the love of God in Christ, as Paul writes in Ephesians.

The great German Lutheran hymn writer Paul Gerhardt (1607-1676) wrote a hymn entitled “Go Forth, My Heart, This Summer Day,” in which he likens our life of faith to the growth of a tree. In the last verse, he prays to God the Holy Spirit:

O Holy Spirit dwell in me so I become a living tree with roots so deeply grounded; O grant that I will sing your praise and bear rich fruit through all my days by all your love surrounded.�

We are grateful for all contributors for this issue. Notably, ILT student Drew Christiansen shares his experience as a non-Lutheran student at ILT; though ILT remains rooted in the Lutheran theological tradition, we recognize that we as Lutherans have much to share with the rest of the Christian world and are welcoming of students from a variety of backgrounds.

Rooted and grounded in love,

Rev. Thomas E. Jacobson, Ph.D.

[1] Paul Gerhardt, “Go Forth, My Heart, This Summer Day,” trans. Gracia Grindal, in ReClaim: Lutheran Hymnal for Church and Home (St. Paul, MN: ReClaim Resources, 2013), hymn 264.

By Jonathan Sorum

By Jack Kilcrease

By Thomas E. Jacobson

By Thomas E. Jacobson

Photo by Sandra Ahn Mode on Unsplash

MONDAY MORSELS NEWS AND EVENTS

Do you have an email address but haven't signed up for our weekly emails? We have two for you. Monday Morsels has a devotional thought and prayer on the upcoming Gospel lesson and a link to Tim Swenson's Table Talk devotion, which is usually based on the Second lesson. Friday's News & Events will apprise you on our development as a school. Email lmiles@ilt.edu and I will put you on the list. You also need to be on our Word at Work magazine list and you can request I see if you are on the list. I can update your email, too. You can also send me a note if you have any questions concerning what you want to achieve through your philanthropy, or call my mobile number (311) 471-6202. Thanks!

I Believe

Dr. Jonathan Sorum

“On the third day he rose again. He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father.”

The gospel is not a set of instructions about what we need to “do” in order to be saved (turn away from our sins, trust in Jesus, live a life of obedience, etc.) The gospel is news, the announcement of something that has happened: Jesus is risen from the dead!

And the news is true. Hundreds of people saw the risen Jesus (1 Cor. 15:3-8). It couldn’t have been a hoax or hallucination. He truly is risen from the dead!

And that means that the world is coming to an end. The conclusion of the Old Testament is the promise of a new act of creation. God would raise the dead, and those who had been faithful to him would “shine like the brightness of the sky” forever (Dan. 12:2-3). And now it’s started. Jesus is the first one. We are in the middle of the end, when God is winding up all of history and bringing in his new world.

Of course, the end means judgment. We face a final reckoning. Some will wake to everlasting life and some to everlasting contempt (Dan. 12:2). But—and here’s the great part—only Jesus was raised from the dead. Jesus died as the friend of sinners, convicted under the law of blasphemy because he forgave sinners and welcomed them—something only God can do. But by raising him from the

dead, God declared that Jesus was right and everyone else was wrong. So the friend of sinners now has full power as the only righteous one, God’s only Son. He is the end-time judge. What he says about us is God’s final judgment about us. And what does he say? “Peace be with you!” (Jn. 20:19, 21, 26) He pardons and releases from our sin and makes us part of him, so that we live from him and in him and share in the life he has from God.

Jesus is Lord! No one can contradict him, and no one can prevent him from keeping his promises to us (Rom. 8:31-39). He is at “the right hand of the Father,” which means he possesses the Father’s almighty power. God “has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all” (Eph. 1:22-23). Everything he is, he is for our sake. He will not be separated from us because we are his “fullness,” that which makes him who he is. In fact, God has already “raised us up with him, and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.” (Eph. 2:6)

The gospel is good news, the best news. It is, all by itself, the “the power of God for salvation for everyone who has faith” (Rom. 1:16). Thanks be to God!

Note: This article is the sixth in a twelve-part series on the Apostles’ Creed.

Jonathan Sorum is a Professor and Director of the Doctor of Ministry Program at ILT.

REMEMBERING RASMUS JENSEN: 400 YEARS OF LUTHERANS IN NORTH AMERICA

Thomas E. Jacobson

If you have never heard of Rasmus Jensen, you are not alone. The Lutheran Book of Worship of 1978 included him on the list of commemorations of significant Christians of the past, but the replacement for the LBW , Evangelical Lutheran Worship of 2006, expunged him from the list. The lack of attention given to this man by historians is due to the fact that his life is not terribly consequential. Yet even so, his name is an important footnote in American Lutheran history. He holds the honor of being the first Lutheran pastor in North America.

Little is known of Rasmus Jensen’s life other than his voyage that led him to this continent. No portrait of him was ever painted. In fact, it was only by accident that he came here. He thought he was going to India, but he never made it that far.

King Christian IV of Denmark, like other rulers of the seventeenth century, wanted to

establish trading outposts in Asia. In 1619, he commissioned an expedition to find the Northwest Passage, a route that would be a shortcut from Europe to Asia. The captain of the expedition was Jens Munk, and Rasmus Jensen, as a pastor in the (Lutheran) Church of Denmark, served as the chaplain for the sailors.

Like other attempts at finding the Northwest Passage, the Munk expedition was unsuccessful. The ships entered the Canadian arctic region of Hudson Bay in August of 1619, and they were unable to find a water route out of the bay. The site of their landing is near what is today the town of Churchill, Manitoba. They had no choice but to spend the winter there. In spite of the intense cold, Rasmus Jensen faithfully served as pastor to the crew of sailors. The major holidays of the church year were celebrated, including Christmas. He presided at the funerals of several of the sailors who succumbed to the elements. It was customary at the time for parishioners to offer the pastor gifts for his service. As there was no currency, the sailors brought him animal skins.

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After Christmas, Jensen himself became sick. He continued to preach, however, even from his deathbed. He died on February 20, 1620, the first of many brave Lutheran pastors to serve in the “New World.” When we remember Rasmus Jensen and the crew of his ship, we also remember the many Lutherans who came after them in the following centuries, their faithfulness in hardship, and the faith they passed on to later generations.

Since 1619 marks the four-hundredth anniversary of Lutherans in North America, it is an especially appropriate time for the Institute of Lutheran Theology to begin the initiative described in my longer article. As we launch the North American Lutheran Archive (NALA) 400 years after Lutherans first set foot in North America, may we, following in their footsteps, continue to learn about and share that same good news of Jesus Christ that has been handed on to us.

Most gracious God, we thank you for your servants Rasmus Jensen and all other ministers who have accompanied Christians traveling to distant, desolate, or perilous places, seeking to minister to those they accompanied and to those they met, sharing their hardships in the name of him who humbled himself to share ours, your Son Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.�

Thomas E. Jacobson is Instructor of Christian History at the Institute of Lutheran Theology, editor of The Word at Work magazine, and curator of the North American Lutheran Archive. He also serves as pastor of Good Shepherd Evangelical Lutheran Church of Lindy (rural Bloomfield) Nebraska.

[1] Prayer from http://justus.anglican.org/resources/ bio/106.html

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FORERUNNERS OF THE REFORMATION: JOHN WYCLIFFE

Jack Kilcrease

Although most historians would probably date the beginning of the Protestant Reformation to Luther’s publication of the “95 Theses” in 1517, it has long been recognized that the Reformers of the sixteenth century did not appear out of thin air. Although we could speak of many broad societal trends that led to the outbreak of the Reformation, it is important to recognize the initiative of particular individuals. Therefore, below I will focus on the contribution of one individual who anticipated the later movement for reform, John Wycliffe (ca. 1320-1384).

John Wycliffe is often described as a “Forerunner of the Reformation,” a “Proto-Reformer,” or more poetically as the “Morning Star of the Reformation.” These descriptions are based on the fact that many of Wycliffe’s reforming goals and criticisms of the late medieval church mirror what is found in the later Reformers of the sixteenth century. Likewise, it should also be recognized that there are a great many differences between Wycliffe and the later sixteenth century Reformers. In fact, many of these differences are so great that some recent historians have questioned whether it is appropriate to see forerunners like Wycliffe as precursors of Luther and his colleagues at all.

Wycliffe’s Early Life

John Wycliffe was born in the village of Hipswell in the vicinity of Yorkshire in the north of England at some point in the early to mid-1320s. The exact date of his birth is not known, since in premodern Europe there were no birth certificates, and most common people did not know their exact age. To

the extent that historians can reconstruct his early life, he seems to have received his education close to his parents’ home. Later, possibly in the mid1340s, he arrived at Oxford where he pursued his higher education.

While at Oxford, there appear to have been some significant influences on Wycliffe that would shape his later theology. First was the work of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Brandwardine. Brandwardine wrote a famous treatise entitled “On the Cause of God against the Pelagians,” which was aimed at the theology of William of Occam and other Franciscan theologians known as the via moderna (“the modern way”). This group of theologians taught that although humans cannot not merit salvation in a full sense, they could act in such a manner so as to merit God’s communication of supernatural grace. Such grace would empower them to earn their salvation. This was possible because God had agreed to recognize the efforts of those who strove to do “what was within them” (in Latin: facere quod in se est ) as meriting the first grace. It should be noted that this was the same theology that Luther was taught at the University of Erfurt by way of the later German theologian Gabriel Biel. Indeed, many scholars attribute Luther’s famous struggle in the monastery to his striving to “doing what was within him” to merit God’s grace.

In response to this theology of sin and grace, Brandwardine appealed to the teachings of St. Augustine from centuries before. In his time, Augustine attacked a heresy known as Pelagianism that taught that humans could by their own reason and strength merit salvation. Augustine’s theology was of course also influential on the young Luther and certainly drove him on to his final great Reformation insight. However, it should be cautioned that Brandwardine and later Wycliffe did not actually propose a return to the biblical gospel.

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Rather, like Augustine, Brandwardine and later Wycliffe taught that it was by God’s grace alone that human beings are empowered to merit their own salvation.

Another significant influence on Wycliffe appears to have been the advent of the Black Plague in 1348. Wycliffe, much like Luther after him, seems to have taken this event as a harbinger of the end times. Indeed, in one early treatise entitled “The Last Age of the Church,” Wycliffe suggested that the second coming of Christ would very likely occur before the end of the fourteenth century. It should be observed that such apocalyptic expectations were not uncommon in the later Middle Ages. There were a variety of groups that subscribed to apocalyptic beliefs, such as the Waldensians, Joachimists, Dulcinians, and Spiritual Franciscans. Beyond this, Wycliffe believed that the plague was a form of divine punishment on the great corruption that he observed among the clergy of his day.

In 1356, Wycliffe earned his master’s degree. He was soon appointed to the head of Balliol College at Oxford. After this, he was a priest at various parishes and the head of Canterbury Hall, where he worked with a group of young men preparing for the priesthood. In the midst of this, he earned a doctorate in theology. Finally, Wycliffe was granted the position of rector at Ludgershall close to Oxford, something that allowed him to continue to participate in the life of the university.

Wycliffe’s Call to Reform

Although Wycliffe appears to have broken with the theology of the medieval church at some point early in his career, in 1374 his reforming career took a new turn. He was appointed to a commission by the English government to work out a series of disputed questions of jurisdiction between the pope and the king of England in the Belgian city of Bruges. When he returned from the negotiations, Wycliffe was apparently so unhappy

with his encounter with the papal representative that he began to write a series of tracts promoting ideas of reform. Specifically, he attacked the sale of church offices (known as “simony” named after Simon Magus in Acts 8) and the practice of indulgences. He argued against the idea that the church as an institution possesses the ability to engage political governance. The idea that the church had at least some right to engage in temporal rule was a popular one in the Middle Ages and was often referred to as the “theory of the two swords,” based on an allegorical reading of Luke 22:38.

To argue many of these points, Wycliffe composed a treatise entitled “On Civil Domain.” Here he argues that all authority and property ultimately belong to God. For this reason, people who own property only own it insofar as God permits them to do so, since it is in a sense on loan from him. From this it logically follows that if people cease to obey God’s will they necessarily forfeit their property. Because the Roman Church was utterly corrupt, Wycliffe argued that it was therefore lawful for the temporal governments to take away the church’s property and to force the clergy to live in poverty. Seemingly, part of Wycliffe’s proposal that clergy should be poor was rooted in the Franciscan movement’s claim that Christ and the apostles had lived in poverty and that this should be the ideal practice of the contemporary church.

To say the least, Wycliffe’s views were not popular with the pope or others in the hierarchy of the institutional church. Pope Gregory XI condemned many of Wycliffe’s teachings. The bishop of London summoned Wycliffe to appear before him in order to answer a series of charges, the exact details of which are lost to us.

In meeting with the English ecclesiastical hierarchy in London, Wycliffe was accompanied by John of Gaunt. John of Gaunt was the third son of King Edward III and therefore an influential member of the English royal family. Gaunt and others in the English government favored Wycliffe because

he had said that secular governments had the right to take away the church’s property and temporal power if the government did not feel that the church was living up to its moral duties. Indeed, since the eleventh century the English kings had frequently quarreled with the Roman Church about jurisdiction. Wycliffe’s positions were therefore seen as a way of giving the secular government the upper hand. This desire on the part of the English monarchy would come to fruition in the sixteenth century, when King Henry VIII broke with Rome and made himself the head of the Church of England.

From this point forward, most of the rest of Wycliffe’s life was tied up in a series of official and unofficial tribunals. It would be tedious to go through all of them in detail, but it is sufficient to say that Wycliffe was generally able to rally the support of members of the secular English government as long as he confined his protests to abuses of power by the church. When Wycliffe began to seek to reformulate church doctrine, he largely lost the support of the secular government, including his patron John of Gaunt. Despite this, he was never executed for heresy in his lifetime and died a relatively old man in 1384, probably in his mid-60s.

After his death, Wycliffe was officially condemned as a heretic by the Council of Constance in 1415. As strange as it may sound to modern ears, his body was exhumed from its place of burial and burned by government and church officials. Despite his condemnation, a group of his followers known as the “Lollards” continued to exist covertly, particularly in southern England, until they were absorbed into the larger reforming movement of the sixteenth century English Reformation.

sixteenth century. Nevertheless, it should be cautioned that upon closer examination, many of these similarities are quite superficial.

First, both Wycliffe and Luther agreed on the ultimate authority of the Bible in matters of faith and life. Neither believed that there was any biblical basis for the authority or office of the pope. Similarly, just as Luther translated the Bible from its original Hebrew and Greek texts into his native High German, the Lollard movement that Wycliffe sparked translated the Latin Bible (called the Vulgate) into Middle English, the version of English spoken by common people in the later Middle Ages.

Although this appears to be a similarity, it must be noted that Wycliffe and his followers did not think of the Bible’s authority as centering on Christ and the gospel in the manner of Luther and the other Wittenberg Reformers. Rather, for Wycliffe and the Lollards, the Bible was understood as a supreme divine law book. It was important for ordinary people to be able to read the Bible, not so they could better understand the unconditional promise of the gospel, but rather as a means of discerning which works were divinely approved as means of meriting salvation. Wycliffe and the Lollards contrasted the Bible as a supreme law book with the Canon Law of the pope and the church-approved works of monasticism, pilgrimages, and indulgences, all of which they opposed.

Wycliffe’s Doctrinal Views: Similarities and Contrast with the Lutheran Reformation

As noted above, one of the reasons that Wycliffe is seen as a forerunner of the Reformation is that there are many similarities between his stances and that of the later Reformers of the

This legalistic way of thinking about the Bible’s authority connects with Wycliffe’s larger understanding of salvation. As was mentioned earlier, Wycliffe, like the young Luther, was heavily influenced by Thomas Brandwardine’s attempt at reviving St. Augustine’s belief that salvation came by grace alone. Nevertheless, as Gerhard Forde correctly observed, there is a profound difference between salvation by grace alone and salvation by grace through faith alone. Luther taught that grace is God’s unmerited favor, grasped by faith in Christ external to the sinner. By contrast, Wycliffe held with St. Augustine that God’s grace was a power

the worked interior to the sinner. Its primary function is to make sinners better people so that they can curry God’s favor.

Lastly, much like Luther, Wycliffe rejected the doctrine of transubstantiation. Transubstantiation is the Roman Catholic teaching that in the Mass the body and blood of Jesus are not merely present in the bread and wine, but that the elements are literally transformed into them while external qualities of the bread and wine (called “accidents”) remain. This theory of how the body and blood of Christ were present in the Lord’s Supper was largely worked out by borrowing conceptual categories from the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle. Aristotle’s thought was extremely influential on the medieval church.

Luther criticized transubstantiation because it contradicted the scriptural testimony that the bread and wine remain present after the words of institution are spoken (1 Cor. 10:16). He also rejected the doctrine on the grounds that it rationalistically allowed a Christian doctrine to be virtually defined by a Greek philosopher’s categories of thought and in direct contradiction of the Bible.

By contrast, Wycliffe’s criticism of transubstantiation was as rationalistic as the medieval Church’s promotion of it. He claimed that external qualities of things (what Aristotle called “accidents”) necessarily adhered in the essence of a thing (what Aristotle called “substance”). Wycliffe claimed that it was literally impossible for the inner of essence of a thing to change while external qualities remained the same. Consequently, it was impossible for the bread and wine to turn into the body and blood of Christ while still appearing as bread and wine. Regarding whether Christ’s body and blood were actually present in the Lord’s Supper, Wycliffe was extremely vague. Nevertheless, he appears to have favored something like a spiritual presence, much like the later Reformed tradition.

Conclusion

Although Wycliffe possessed many shortcomings as a theologian, he should be commended for having voiced many concerns that would later be echoed in Luther and the other sixteenth century Reformers’ writing. Moreover, it should be noted that he and his followers played a significant role in influencing Jan Hus and Jerome of Prague. Although Luther did not agree with the theology of Hus entirely, the Reformer famously commended him at the Leipzig debate (1519). Ultimately, Wycliffe’s main limitation as a theologian and reformer lay in his inability to see the centrality of the gospel in the formulation of all Christian doctrine. In our engagement with the Scriptures, we should seek to avoid the same mistake.

Jack Kilcrease is Associate Professor of Historical and Systematic Theology at the Institute of Lutheran Theology.

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INTRODUCING THE NORTH AMERICAN LUTHERAN ARCHIVE

Thomas E. Jacobson

According to the Danish philosopher Søren Aabye Kierkegaard’s journal, “It is perfectly true, as the philosophers say, that life must be understood backwards. But they forget the other proposition, that it must be lived forwards.”

Normally, I am cautious about using isolated quotes from famous individuals in the service of promoting an idea. I have often felt that to do so threatens to trivialize the larger themes with which these people deal. Furthermore, one runs the risk, by using an isolated quote, of betraying the original intention of the author. Yet while acknowledging the complexity of Kierkegaard’s thought, I felt that his insight in the above quote is appropriate for introducing a new initiative at the Institute of Lutheran Theology: The North American Lutheran Archive (NALA).

ILT was founded in order to respond to a need for solid theological education among Lutherans who generally occupy the “center” of the Lutheran tradition in North America. Though welcoming of Lutherans from all traditions and even those from non-Lutheran traditions (see Drew

Christiansen’s article in this issue), those from Augsburg Lutheran Churches (ALC), Lutheran Congregations in Mission for Christ (LCMC), the Canadian Association of Lutheran Congregations (CALC), and the North American Lutheran Church (NALC) form the bulk of the student population. To the even casual observer, these last few decades have witnessed significant changes in the Lutheran landscape in North America. There have been controversies and schisms that have resulted in the formation of these and other groups. At the same time, there have been movements for reform and mission that have grown out of these conflicts.

As ILT continues to develop, we recognize the importance of preserving this aspect of Lutheran history in North America. Currently, there is no other institution devoting attention to this task, and there is a danger, especially in the electronic age, that we are not leaving a “paper trail” of our current situation. For generations after us to understand this era in which we live, we must be intentional about providing future historians with the tools to interpret and learn from the present. Our vision for the NALA grew out of this realization.

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We propose the following mission statement for this archive:

The North American Lutheran Archive is a center of research and learning dedicated to the ecumenical theological enterprise through fostering a deeper understanding of the Lutheran traditions in North America.

Our vision statement addresses how this mission will be carried out:

The North American Lutheran Archive will collect, arrange, preserve, and make accessible publications, documents, and artifacts that support research and teaching of the historic development of the various Lutheran traditions in North America, with emphasis on the reconfiguration of American Lutheranism over the last few decades.

One of the roles that I have been asked to fill at ILT is the curator of the NALA. I will work closely with the current information services staff at ILT in carrying out this role. As a historian, much of my research and writing could not have been done without the careful work of archivists and curators of various collections. Things such as congregational records and personal correspondence from a century or more ago proved to be invaluable in my interpretation of history. Therefore, I have a sense of what kind of information is important to preserve for posterity. I also understand the value of having records of various organizations held at a single location.

In addition to holding historical records of various movements for reform and renewal among American Lutherans during the last few decades, we also envision the NALA serving a similar role for the many independent Lutheran organizations for outreach and mission with which the Lutheran “center” tends to associate. We also wish to be of service to the various church bodies themselves

that comprise this Lutheran “center.” We are open to holding records of the church bodies, their various districts, the congregations themselves, as well as pastors. If you are a pastor and would like a place to store important records from your ministry activity, please contact me. Similarly, I welcome significant records of congregations in the Lutheran “center.” Again, you may contact me at (tjacobson@ilt.edu).

We are grateful to historian Ray Kibler III, who has graciously provided ILT with a gift of his collection of books and documents related to American Lutheran history. This “Kibler Collection” will form the initial backbone of the NALA. Over the coming months, I will be making many contacts with individuals and organizations in an effort to expand our collection. This process will take some time, but I am happy to report that I already have made a number of contacts with individuals in possession of valuable information.

In reality, the NALA will always be a work in progress as history continues to unfold. But we are convinced of the importance of providing the opportunity for future generations to “understand backwards” and “live forwards.”

Thomas E. Jacobson is Instructor of Christian History at

the

Institute of Lutheran Theology,

editor

of

The Word at

Work

magazine, and curator of the North American Lutheran Archive. He also serves as pastor of Good Shepherd Evangelical Lutheran Church of Lindy (rural Bloomfield) Nebraska.

ILT: NOT JUST FOR LUTHERANS

Andrew "Drew" Christiansen

T he late Rt. Rev. Michael Ramsey, former Archbishop of Canterbury, once lamented, “Anglicans have generally been ignorant of Luther’s theology…”� Ramsey is of course remembered as an ecumenical churchman, and this was directed in a spirit of charity and humility toward fellow Christians “across the Rhine.” I pray that my Christian brothers and sisters from the Lutheran tradition may find me an exception, among many exceptions, to that rule.

I am an Episcopal priest. I serve as an associate at St. Mark’s Cathedral in Shreveport, Louisiana as well as the school chaplain of St. Mark’s Cathedral School. I am also a second-year Master of Sacred Theology student at the Institute of Lutheran Theology. I am blessed by being connected with both of these places. I did not grow up planning on going into ministry, though; I did not feel the call until my early-to-mid-twenties. However, God and religion were never foreign things to me. I was raised from kindergarten through eighth grade in a Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod school, with religion class, catechism, and the whole nine yards. I am ever grateful for learning about Jesus Christ through my education since childhood. Without that faith foundation given to me by God through this early religious education and catechesis, I can honestly say that I would probably not be someone who ever went into the ministry, let alone stayed a part of the church.

In my early teenage years, I became involved with a small Sunday morning youth group at a local Episcopal church in my hometown of Saginaw, Michigan. After growing up as a Lutheran and then attending public high school, I became curious about what other kinds of Christianity were like. While I may not have fully understood this desire and curiosity then, I believe now that it was God leading me to discover how Christians are a universal body of believers, not limited to any one denomination.

Ten years later, after the not-so-unusual “ups

and downs” that characterize adolescence and early adulthood, I was discerning ordained ministry in the Episcopal Church. My bishop at the time had three seminaries in mind that he wanted me to consider. I ended up going to Bexley-Seabury. At that time, Bexley-Seabury had a residential campus in Columbus, Ohio, where their Master of Divinity program was fully integrated into Trinity Lutheran Seminary. It was an interesting joint AnglicanLutheran setting. This was actually not one of the reasons I felt drawn to go to Bexley-Seabury, at least at first, though I of course appreciated the ecumenical environment.

During my second year in a theology class, we were given an assignment to write a summary and reflection on a primary work from a figure in church history in the early modern era. I decided to write mine on Martin Luther’s commentary on Paul’s letter to the Galatians. I had not read or considered Luther’s work in years. Honestly, I had not paid attention to Luther since I read the “Small Catechism” in eighth grade, and I remember usually having another book inside of my copy during class, which I was reading instead. The pastor actually caught me one day! But as I worked on this seminary assignment and read about Luther’s insights on Christ’s work on the cross for us, I suddenly was reminded of that message I had received in my childhood, that as fallen of a human being as I am, I have a Savior who has paid the ultimate price for me, that even though I am a flawed person marred with imperfections, the mercy of God reaches and covers me. I was reminded that every Sunday when I come up to the altar, I have absolutely nothing I can bring to God to justify myself, and at the same time that I am blessed by a God whose love knows no bounds.

It is odd that so often we as Christians forget about God’s grace. In many of the “mainline” church circles, it is sadly and increasingly looked down

upon to exclaim with gratitude that “Jesus has died for my sins” or even for one to suggest that he or she is a sinner in need of God’s grace. But this is what Christian belief is. Churches get so tangled up in trying to address every world issue deemed important enough to occupy their time that this basic Christian truth is often neglected. But that day as I read Luther, I had a realization where I internalized that truth in a profound way. It would be an understatement to call this realization that day a formative experience. It was that and much more.

From then on, I had a deep appreciation of the Lutheran tradition, as it is my heritage, while being an Anglican. This is largely what led me to ILT. When I spoke with Dr. Jonathan Sorum in the fall of 2017 as I started to entertain the idea of doing an STM degree, I remember strongly resonating with something he said about his own academic career: “After seminary, I was just thirsty for more, and I wanted to learn more.” He told me about how ILT is an excellent place for people in full-time ministry to study, especially for people who need it in a distance learning program. I have experienced ILT to be a great and rare mix of rigor and flexibility.

Also, few seminaries can boast the curriculum ILT offers. The first course I took at ILT was actually a course required for M.Div. students, “History of Christian Thought III: 1700-1900,” where we got explore the great depths of the Enlightenment, nineteenth century German Idealism, French Ultramontanism, Catholic and Protestant Tübingen schools, and right and left-wing Hegelian critiques. These types of cultural forces are barely discussed in many core historical theology courses, and yet they are immensely important in seeing why theology is what it is today. Some seminaries today are shedding the kind of historical and systematic electives where one would even learn about these topics under the notion that this kind of theological education is not relevant. Other seminaries are combining historical and systematic departments into one, even though they are two different disciplines. Sadly, I think this symptomatic of what is going on in many seminaries and divinity schools today: a dangerous

lack of interest in hearing and appreciating religious and theological voices of the past, who now worship in a realm beyond past, present, and future, in their own time and place.

ILT is a place where I can actually learn and feel free. It is also an exception within American Lutheranism. I cannot think of many other Lutheran seminaries where I can look at two faculty members in a room together, who I know take different positions on a “hot-button” issue, and yet both feel free to share their view while remaining highly collegial toward each other. The people who lead ILT genuinely care about each other and respect the differences they have with one another. ILT occupies a ground in American Lutheranism that brings together Lutherans who would not otherwise be together. As one of our own faculty members Robert Benne has pointed out, American Lutheranism has experienced unfortunate polarizations in many of its institutional and denominational structures.² Many of them have been sadly torn apart when there is not like-mindedness. Not ILT. They value diversity, and they overcome differences to model a biblical sense of community.

As an Episcopalian, I have experienced ILT’s Christ School of Theology to be a place that fosters further growth and learning for people interested and called to study theology further. I would recommend ILT’s STM program to any ordained minister, regardless of denomination, who believes that God’s truth for us is something that can be studied and discussed both creatively and with reverence.

[1]

[2]

Andrew “Drew” Christiansen is an Episcopal priest and student in the Master of Sacred Theology program at the Institute of Lutheran Theology.

Michael Ramsey, The Anglican Spirit, ed. Dale D. Coleman (Cambridge, MA: Cowley Publication, 2004), 58.

Robert Benne, “The Trials of American Lutheranism,” First Things (May 2011). https://www.firstthings.com/article/2011/05/ the-trials-of-american-lutheranism (accessed December 16, 2019).

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