Did you ever witness a kidnapping?  We think of movies depicting someone forcibly taken against the person’s will and a large cash payment is demanded by the perpetrator.  We are relieved when the villain’s plot is foiled and the captured one is brought to safety. The prophet Hosea described a setting where a specific ransom […]

For many people today, the Lutheran label may not mean what it ought to mean. Much of Lutheranism, as observed on the world scene, is considerably liberal in its theology. A large number of Lutheran scholars do not accept the foundational premise that Dr. Martin Luther himself took for granted: the Bible is verbally inspired […]

“If need or affliction in temporal things comes, which many of us both have experienced and will experience, then He wants us to seek help with Him and through Him, in His name, with the Father. He wants us to learn that even if we use the abilities and means He has given us, we […]

The opening of the 2020-2021 school year for both public and private schools will be remembered for the vigorous efforts to overcome obstacles.  State-by-state and district-by-district restrictions, plus internal school board decisions, have had to be weighed.  How much will be learning online?  How to do in-classroom sessions in keeping with the health guidelines?  How […]

The iron door to the dungeon was tightly sealed.  Only a trickle of light made its way through a small crack in the ceiling.  The woman stood alone in the middle of the sealed room.  Her name was Alice Benden, and she had been imprisoned inside England’s Canterbury Castle for her religious convictions.  Under Queen […]