Learning about Lutheranism

[Joykins]

Hello.

I was brought up in one of the (many) Brethren sects, and later attended some other kinds of evangelical churches with a generally Baptist-type theology.

I have lately come to believe things that I believe may be more in line with Lutheranism (or perhaps other Protestant traditions). My reasons for being interested in Lutheranism are the following:

1. Although my husband was raised Baptist, his family is generally Lutheran and he has a positive opinion of Lutheranism from the services he's attended. I could not "switch" denominations and leave my family behind.

2. Lutherans believe in the Real Presence, correct? And have other sacramental beliefs? This has become increasingly important to me. Also I would like to participate in a more liturgical form of worship.

3. When I went to Christian school (Brethren variety; but still) we did a HUGE unit (months?) on Martin Luther and I still remember it vividly, and positively.

4. There are both liberal and conservative Lutherans synods. I view this as essentially positive because IMO a "denomination" should encompass both these ways of seeing the world (if not more...).

Given the above, I was wondering if I could get more information about the various Lutheran churches and synods.

What are the emphases of Lutheran teachings?

What are the Lutheran distinctives?

I come from this broadly anabaptist background--Lutherans practice infant baptism. What are your beliefs about the meaning of baptism?

And finally, are you really like the jokes on the Prairie Home Companion? ;)


Thanks,

Joy

[SPALATIN]

Hello.

I was brought up in one of the (many) Brethren sects, and later attended some other kinds of evangelical churches with a generally Baptist-type theology.

I have lately come to believe things that I believe may be more in line with Lutheranism (or perhaps other Protestant traditions). My reasons for being interested in Lutheranism are the following:

1. Although my husband was raised Baptist, his family is generally Lutheran and he has a positive opinion of Lutheranism from the services he's attended. I could not "switch" denominations and leave my family behind.

2. Lutherans believe in the Real Presence, correct? And have other sacramental beliefs? This has become increasingly important to me. Also I would like to participate in a more liturgical form of worship.

3. When I went to Christian school (Brethren variety; but still) we did a HUGE unit (months?) on Martin Luther and I still remember it vividly, and positively.

4. There are both liberal and conservative Lutherans synods. I view this as essentially positive because IMO a "denomination" should encompass both these ways of seeing the world (if not more...).

Given the above, I was wondering if I could get more information about the various Lutheran churches and synods.

Joykins,

Yours is the kind of post I love to see here. Seeing others become interested in the Lutheran church because of it's rich liturgy and belief in the sacraments is very heartening.

I will try to answer these on a line by line method.

What are the emphases of Lutheran teachings?

The emphasis in Luther's teachings are that Christ did it all for us. We do nothing to merit the kingdom of God. Christ was put to death on a cross for our salvation 2000 years ago. We do not accept Christ, but we receive him. Salvation is something that was done for us. Our teachings are therefore Christocentric.

What are the Lutheran distinctives?

Distinctives are a tough one because Lutherans, like many others range from the very conservative to the very liberal. The liberals of course are more apt to be more tolerant of people and their sins than the more conservative. Liberals will be more in favor of ordaining women and openly homosexual men and women; whereas the more conservative would not. It is not that the conservatives are against these people per se, but do not believe that unrepentant sinners (homosexuals) should occupy these offices.

Women's ordination is a sticky subject for some. The more liberal synod in America (ELCA) has had women pastors since its founding in 1988 and this is because the ALC and LCA before the merger allowed this practice. The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod does not allow women's ordination though there are factions within the synod that would like to see this change.

The main distinctives that are common across the board are that we have a rich christocentric liturgy that most Lutheran Churches still practice on a weekly basis.

I come from this broadly anabaptist background--Lutherans practice infant baptism. What are your beliefs about the meaning of baptism?

Lutherans believe in one baptism for the remission of sins. When Luther and the founders of our faith began they began putting together a book that would include Luther's large and small catechisms, The Augsburg Confessions, The Apology of the Augsburg confessions and many other writings that we consider to be the exposition of our faith. to get a true understanding of Baptism in the Lutheran faith you might want to check here (http://www.bookofconcord.org/augsburgconfession.html#article9), or here. (http://www.bookofconcord.org/smallcatechism.html#baptism) You can also go stay at the website and look up other references to Baptism that you might find as useful.

And finally, are you really like the jokes on the Prairie Home Companion? ;)
Thanks,

Joy


Garrison Keillor has made fun of the Lutherans many times. At best I would describe what he says as a caricature of what Lutherans are like. Of course we laugh at them because Lutherans have a great sense of humor.

Hope this helped.

[LilLamb219]

Scott did a great job of answering your questions.

One thing to keep in mind is that Lutherans see the need to properly distinguish between Law and Gospel in order to understand what scriptures are saying. If one doesn't understand the purpose of the Law and what it does, one might not understand the Gospel more fully.

[SPALATIN]

Scott did a great job of answering your questions.

One thing to keep in mind is that Lutherans see the need to properly distinguish between Law and Gospel in order to understand what scriptures are saying. If one doesn't understand the purpose of the Law and what it does, one might not understand the Gospel more fully.

Darn, I knew I forgot something. ;)

[Joykins]

Could you expound on that a little more?

[SPALATIN]

Could you expound on that a little more?

expound on what? Law and Gospel or the Proper distinction thereof?

I can only say what Pastor's in the Missouri, Wisconsin and other more conservative Synods practice.

In the Sermon, you will hear the Sermon text and on that text you will hear two parts. You will hear a "law" part and you will hear a "gospel" part. The law is there to convict you of sin. While the Gospel introduces Christ who paid the penalty for that sin on the Cross.

the purpose is to bring the listener to repentance of their sins and give them knowledge that God in his love forgives sins through faith in Christ. So in effect you are taken to the cross where you lay the sins you have been charged with and found guilty by the law at the foot of Jesus cross where he has died and you are clean.

[Joykins]

Oh, that's really neat! Thanks.

Joy

[BigNorsk]

I believe you will find Lutherans to be very much Christ centered in their theology. You could go to other forums and ask what the major teaching or theme of the Bible is and you'd get all kinds of answers, salvation, sanctification, the fight between good and evil. Lutherans would answer Jesus Christ.

Lutherans are sacramental, but not in the way that many others are. As Lutherans sacraments are instituted by Christ as a means of grace, the Word of God is combined with worldly elements. But the simple performance of them gives nothing. Grace comes through the acceptance of God's Word, faith if you will. Communion, for example, is another form of the Gospel. Here is the body of Christ given for you, the blood of Christ, shed for you. To accept the elements is to accept the gospel, to believe that indeed Christ, God himself, came to earth and suffered and died for you.

You are correct that Lutherans believe in the real presence of Christ in, under and with the elements. We don't know exactly how Christ does it, nor do we need to. We accept his Word through faith. The elements are still present, but in some supernatural way, Jesus joins himself to the elements. This joining is a real joining, not just a joining in the spiritual only sense.

Note that Communion is a reliance on Christ, while the minister says the words, it isn't him who has the power to unite the elements with Christ, it is Christ who does so. We don't rely on the person to have Communion, it is Christ that actually makes it possible.

If you take baptism, it is much the same. It is the gospel, we are united with Christ in death that we may be united with him in life. It really isn't that Lutherans teach infant baptism, we teach baptism, making no such distinctions that would separate infants from their Lord. We see both that families in the New Testament were baptised together and have the evidence through the ages that many Christians were indeed baptised as an infant. We are saved by grace and baptism bestows grace, so indeed infants receive God's grace through baptism. It is important to note that Lutherans do not teach or believe once saved always saved so while it would be correct to believe that infants are saved, it isn't correct to believe that someone who was properly baptised but spent their life resisting God's grace is saved simply because he was baptised. Since baptism fundamentally depends on God and not on us, any baptism which properly includes God's Word and the earthly elements is valid. We don't go around thinking, did I believe enough when I was baptised, what if my baptism wasn't properly done? God himself really performs your baptism it doesn't rely on your minister or even you being worthy.

Rather than a personal experience being the "proof" of salvation, Lutherans look to the Bible and believe it. When it says those who believe in Jesus Christ are saved, we believe it. You don't have to work your way up to be good enough, nor do we revise our understanding when someone apostacizes and falls away. If they do not believe, they are not saved.

Original sin is real sin, not just a blotch on our nature. Man cannot by his own understanding or will come to God, he must be called. While we cannot come to God on our own, we can reject or resist his saving grace. So while we do believe God when he tells us Jesus died for the sins of the world, we are not universalists. Many or most resist and reject God's salvation. It is possible for a believer to apostacize and reject God.

You will or should anyway hear more law in a Lutheran church than an anabaptist, though some anabaptists have subjected themselves to quite a set of laws and if in one of those you will probably hear a lot of that law. But a Lutheran has 3 uses for the Law.
1. to restrain us from transgressions. Laws both Gods and man's goal is to make us behave properly. An example of this would be a person who though he hates someone and would gladly kill them, he is restrained from doing so by his fear of the law.
2. To show us just how evil we are, it reveals our true nature. One which is contrary to the law. It is the trusted schoolmaster to lead us to the need for God's grace.
3. That even for believers the Law remains as a guide. Also the sinful nature we inherited from Adam is never completely done away with in this life and so the law is still taught to guide us and restrain us. This is not to teach that believers are under the law only that we are still taught by the law. For instance let us say you are a believer, freed from the law, but you are behaving in ways that are clearly against the law, say you are stealing from your neighbor. It avoids the lawlessness that some think is grace.

You should also hear about God's grace in every service.

The major teachings come right from the Reformation. Central are the doctrines of salvation by God's grace alone (Sola Gratia), through faith alone (Sola Fide) for the sake of Christ's merit alone (Solus Christus).

Major differences between synods come about largely due to their system of bible study. Some study using the historical-critical method while others follow the historical-grammatical method. Following with their methods, those who follow the historical-grammatical method believe in the verbal inspiration of the Bible, while generally, the historical-critical lutherans would hold that the Bible is inspired but not word-by-word. Both would hold to sola Scriptura, the scriptures alone, but would vary some in how they see the scriptures.

They also tend to split out on form of church governance. The ecclesiatical government synods such as the ELCA primarily govern through the ministerial order. The congregational lutherans govern more on the local level with the congregation being the basic governmental unit. Neither of these forms of government tend to be absolute, with some characteristics of both kinds present in most synods.

Another split is the so-called open versus closed communion policies. Some Lutherans will allow any believer to partake of Communion. Others limit it to those who are in full communion with the synod. In practice, many of the congregations in closed communion synods practice open communion. It would be good if you visit a Lutheran congregation to talk with the minister about communion beforehand.

Lutherans teach that all believers are priests of Christ. You don't have to go to someone or something that functions as a intermediary between you and God. Christ is our intercessor, our mediator. There is some tension there between the priesthood of believers and the practice of closed communion since it does indeed seem to be operating as an intermediary to God, but the concern is not to limit God's grace but to make sure that people are not practicing Communion in an unworthy manner and so eating and drinking judgement.

You are probably familiar with the double predestination teachings of Calvinism and the no predestination of most anabaptists. Lutherans teach single predestination. God predestines us to salvation, but those who are lost are lost because they reject God's will. It can seem a bit confusing at first, but if you just realize that it is God who is responsible for salvation and man and satan who are responsible for condemnation it makes sense.

That's probably enough for now.

Marv

ps We are just like Prarie Home Companion says we are, all above average.

[Joykins]

Thank you, Marv. That answers a *lot* of my questions. There is an ELCA church near us (well, 3 really, but 1 is closest) with open communion that we are planning on visiting soon.



You are probably familiar with the double predestination teachings of Calvinism and the no predestination of most anabaptists. Lutherans teach single predestination. God predestines us to salvation, but those who are lost are lost because they reject God's will. It can seem a bit confusing at first, but if you just realize that it is God who is responsible for salvation and man and satan who are responsible for condemnation it makes sense.

Nothing about the idea of predestination (except no predestination) makes sense to me, so that's OK, I won't understand this one either.

ps We are just like Prarie Home Companion says we are, all above average.
^_^