Pastor Chris Brademeyer’s Podcast

The Bread King

Lent has a sober tone. In it, we hear about sin, repentance, and the suffering that will lead Christ to the cross. While this is generally true, here in the middle of Lent there is a small break in the tone of the season. This Sunday is traditionally called Laetare, a Latin word that means “Rejoice.” The name comes from the ancient introit of the day: “Rejoice, O Jerusalem.” This temporary relaxation of the seriousness of Lent reminds us that there is joy even in the most serious of circumstances. Life, after all, is not so simple as to give us joy at one time and only sorrow at another. Funerals remind us of this with the mix of laughter and tears that accompany them.
So even during the somber, serious season of Lent, the Church pauses to rejoice.
The reason for that joy is what we see in our Gospel today: Christ provides abundantly for His people. The miracle of the feeding of the five thousand is one of the most well-known miracles in the entire New Testament. In fact, it is the only miracle of Jesus other than the resurrection that is recorded in all four Gospels. That alone tells us something important. The evangelists, that is to say, the writers of the four Gospels, want us to see that this miracle is not just a story about an abundance of bread. It reveals who Jesus is, what kind of King He is, and what kind of care He has for His people.

When You Pray

Prayer is one of the most basic and familiar parts of the Christian life. Even those who know very little about Christianity often know that Christians pray. Yet familiarity can sometimes hide the deeper truth. Because prayer is common, we may assume we already understand it. But when we listen carefully to the words of our Lord in the Gospel, we discover that prayer is not quite what many people imagine it to be.
In the world around us, prayer is often treated as something dramatic or impressive. It becomes a performance. The person who uses the most elaborate language, the longest sentences, or the most emotional expressions is assumed to be the most devout. In other cases, prayer becomes a way of drawing attention to oneself. The act that should be directed toward God quietly becomes directed toward other people.
But Jesus speaks very differently about prayer.

Kingdom Divided?

Our Gospel reading presents the most basic conflict of our world, that between our God and the Enemy, Satan. That is to say, our Lord cast out a demon. Infirmity, in this case muteness, was cast aside and a man was healed. In Christ, the kingdom of God broke into this fallen world with power and mercy. One would think that such a miraculous overthrow of the Devil’s rule would be met with rejoicing. But instead of responding with joy, some accused Jesus of casting out demons by Beelzebul, the prince of demons. Other, more skeptical people, demanded additional signs from heaven.
What unfolded was not merely a dispute about a miracle. It was a revelation of the great spiritual reality that stands behind all human history: there are two realms, two rulers, two powers at work in this world. And Jesus says there is no neutral ground.

The Importance of Doctrine

Why does doctrine matter? Many well-meaning, perfectly sincere people, Christian and otherwise, claim that doctrine, that is teachings, are options, not truths. But this is not the historic Christian position. We have creeds, the Nicene, Apostles’, and Athanasian, that we written to lay out the boundaries of Christian discussions. That is, they divide true things about Christ and false things that lead away from Him. To be brief, doctrine matters because it gives us Christ as He truly is.
Christianity is not built on religious sentiment or spiritual emotions. It is built on a real Lord who lived, died, and rose in real history. If Christ is real, then what we say about Him can be either true or false, right or wrong. The historical reality of Jesus demands specificity. He is not a collection of ideas or mythologies from which we may draw at our leisure. He is a true and living Savior, who really became incarnate in the womb of the Virgin Mary. Who really suffered and died and rose again.

3P1S Episode 25 - The Divine Call: The Role and Responsibilities of the Pastor

When does a pastor go too far and become a church tyrant? When does a church expect too much and make a pastor a church employee? Where is the line? In this episode, we cover the topic of the Pastor's Divine Call - and where his role and responsibilities begin and end.

Called to Holiness

The traditional name for this Sunday, the second in Lent, is Reminiscere. It means, “remember.” It comes from the Introit which says, “Remember Your mercy, O Lord, and Your steadfast love.” In this season of Lent, the Church prays that God would remember His mercy, which He loves to do more than anything else. And today, through the Apostle Paul in our Epistle lesson, the Lord also calls us to remember something else: that we have been called to holiness.
St. Paul wrote to the Christians in Thessalonica that, “This is the will of God, your sanctification.” It is not God’s will that you should be destroyed, forgotten, or condemned. No, God wants you, His people, to be holy. “God has not called us for impurity, but in holiness.” This is a high calling. And it immediately brings us into conflict. This conflict is not firstly with the world out there, but with the sinful self within.

Looking Inward and Looking to Christ

There is something dangerous about looking inward. We live in a time fascinated by constant introspection. We are told to examine our feelings, to search our hearts, to discover our authentic selves. We are told that the truth is within us, and that salvation, if we may use that word, is found by understanding ourselves more deeply. In other words, the general advice is that to become righteous, happy, and whole, we must look inward to find our truest self and then we must orient everything around that central supposed truth.
But the Christian faith teaches something very different. It teaches that salvation does not come from within. Faith does not come from within. Truth does not come from within. Certainly our Lord Jesus Christ does not come from within. Salvation comes from outside of you. Faith comes from outside of you by the Word of God and the work of the Holy Spirit. Truth comes from outside of you. Christ comes to you from outside, through His Word and Sacraments.

The Paradox of the Christian Life

There is something about the Christian life that does not make sense to those outside of the Church. This life does not look like what a religious life is assumed to look like. Followers of God, it is assumed, should be successful, wealthy, and happy. But I think we all know from experience that this is not how the Christian life actually unfolds.
Listen again to how Paul the Apostle describes the Christian life: “As impostors, and yet true; as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold, we live; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, yet possessing everything.” Everything about this is paradoxical. Everything appears to be a contradiction. And yet this paradox is not accidental. It is the very shape of the Christian life, because it is the shape of Christ Himself.
This morning, consider this truth: The Christian life appears weak, but is powerful, because you are united to Christ.

No Longer Troubled

Dear friends in Christ, it is with mixed emotions that we bid farewell to our sister Nadine. I say mixed because there is, on the on hand, a great grief that comes from losing a grandmother, mother, friend, and neighbor. But there is also relief, because the suffering she endured in this fallen body has come to an end, and Christ has brought her safely through death.  I think it fair to say that in such moments in life, the heart is troubled. Troubled by loss. Troubled by things left unsaid. Troubled by conflicted feelings.
“Let not your hearts be troubled,” says our Lord Jesus.

Evangelical Discipline

Our Lord Jesus Christ speaks these words in the Gospel of Matthew as part of the Sermon on the Mount: “Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them… When you give to the needy… when you pray… when you fast… do not be like the hypocrites.”
These words are appointed for Ash Wednesday because they strike directly at the heart of what Lent is and what it is not. Lent is a season of discipline. It is a season of repentance. It is a season of self-examination. But if we misunderstand why we do these things, Lent becomes spiritually dangerous instead of spiritually beneficial. It becomes legalistic instead of evangelical, that is, Gospel oriented. There is a danger in spiritual discipline where our such works become about our righteousness instead of Christ’s righteousness.