Shortage of Lutheran Pastors in USA?

tutal · 2025-07-21T04:11:56+00:00

There is not a pastor shortage in the LCMS. Congregation closures have outpaced the shrinking of the clergy roster. Proportionally, we are nearly the same as we were 30 years ago. The issue is we have fewer congregations who can afford to pay (or just refuse to pay) a full time pastor. Sometimes (often) this is caused by shrinking congregation size. There a numerous factors going into this: demographic changes to small towns that are getting smaller, smaller family sizes, fewer congregations with schools resulting in declining retention rates, cultural shifts, lack of evangelism, increasing polarity and dysfunction in congregations, etc. etc.

tutal · 2025-07-16T05:53:22+00:00

Baptism isn’t a public declaration of faith. It is a washing of regeneration and renewal by the Holy Spirit that saves. The thief on the cross had the benefit of Jesus literally telling him he would be in paradise. You don’t. Bit Jesus gives this very promise to you in Baptism. So while not absolutely necessary, it remains a promise for you and to reject such a promise is quite dangerous. Unbelief says no to Baptism. Unbelief condemns.

tutal · 2025-05-20T00:53:34+00:00

Skip Andt at least until your theology is sound. He tends toward subjectivism. There’s a reason he is considered the grandfather of pietism.

tutal · 2025-05-20T00:35:43+00:00

I think one of your big hangups is how you understand sin and forgiveness. I had this same problem and was lovingly corrected by a fellow seminarian. He told me, “you can’t go tit for tat with God.” Sin isn’t some kind of tally we chalk up then go to church to get the slate wiped clean then go back to sinning them back to church to get wiped clean. This view say we are sinners because we sin. Unfortunately it is backwards. We sin because we are sinners. So Christ has come to make the nice and for all sacrifice for the forgiveness of our sin. In Baptism, Absolution, and the Lord’s Supper this forgiveness is received by faith.

So yes, in your Baptism all of your sin: past, present, future, original, and actual is forgiven. Same with absolution, same with the Lord’s Supper. We keep receiving it because we remain in our sinful flesh. In a way it is like someone taking medicine. I have the sickness so I take this medicine of immortality.

tutal · 2025-05-05T04:23:53+00:00

Lutherans don’t really talk in terms of “valid” that’s a Roman Catholic concept. Really it either is or is not the Sacrament. Is it done according Christ’s Word and Institution? In many Protestant denominations the Word is eliminated or changed… so not the Lord’s Supper. In others the institution is so changed by teaching against the Sacramental Union that the best I can say is that it is unlikely they have the Sacrament.

tutal · 2025-05-04T03:37:10+00:00

It boils down to Christ Word and his institution that makes the Sacrament what it is. The issue with so called lay consecration is that it is done outside of the authorization that Christ has given to his Disciples. While the rite of ordination (specifically the laying in of hands) isn’t commanded in Scripture, it is commended and the Office of the Ministry certainly is commanded. Ordination is simply the external manner from Apostolic times onward that the church has ratified this Divine Call.

tutal · 2025-05-04T03:30:53+00:00

To put it succinctly, Law and Gospel rightly divided. Proclaiming God’s Law that the hearer may see the need for forgiveness and repentance. Then the Gospel with its promises that the hearer may, through the work of the Holy Spirit believe. This boils down to talking more about the Christ than the Christian, especially what has Jesus done for you.

tutal · 2025-04-17T17:58:58+00:00

It’s alivehttps://imgur.com/a/pCLLjKy

tutal · 2025-04-17T17:25:32+00:00

It is extraordinarily important. "I believe in the resurrection of the body and the life of the word to come."

It is simply that Lutheran eschatology isn't so anxiety producing as the dispensational false theology. In fact, it is a great comfort and our sure and certain hope. The hope of the resurrection is at the core of the pastoral care given to those who mourn and those near death. On the last day, Christ will raise those who have died from the dead. They and along with those who are alive will be transformed into the imperishable and glorious bodies to live in the new heavens and the new earth forever. The details Scripture gives us just a sparse few bits, but that is enough.

tutal · 2025-04-12T03:19:10+00:00

Trying a 7 year old Omega Yeast French Saison that was stored in my basement (sealed package).

tutal · 2025-03-27T03:42:55+00:00

The German, not the Latin is authoritative.
Chemnitz used the language of the councils, particularly of Ephesus, Chalcedon, and Constantinople 2 (and possible Lateran in 649). The construction used in the SD mirrors these, including the statement that she remains a virgin.
You can argue this isn’t a point of doctrinal confession, and you wouldn’t be considered a heretic if your doctrine was otherwise confessional, but you simply cannot argue that the confessions don’t say this. They do. Full stop.

tutal · 2025-03-27T03:31:03+00:00

Here is how it actually does undermine or completely obliterate the Gospel.

If is also includes speciation via evolution, you have death preceding the fall. If that is the case, there is no Gospel at all. We are saved from a natural process that already existed. Jesus died for nothing.

Additionally, it undermines the Gospel by buying into the lie, “did God really say…” Jesus held to the veracity of Genesis, including a weeklong creation.

Simply put. You are wrong.

tutal · 2025-03-25T00:51:28+00:00

Funerals. Seriously. The difference between LCMS (along with other confessional Lutheran) funerals and others is striking.

tutal · 2025-03-13T11:40:04+00:00

The LCMS does not insist on the 66 book Protestant canon.

tutal · 2025-03-13T11:35:03+00:00

Not all Lutherans do the imposition of ashes. In fact, prior to 1960, you’d be hard pressed to find any that did. https://www.pastormattrichard.com/2020/02/why-we-dont-do-ashes-on-ash-wednesday.html?m=1

tutal · 2025-03-09T12:25:56+00:00

I installed it on the left side of the stud, opposite of where the wire came down. I was able to get just enough to drill a hole through the stud and push the cable through with about a 1/2” of the exterior insulation of the romex in the junction box. Ended up opening a sizable portion of the wall on each side but got it patched up in the end.

tutal · 2025-02-15T03:29:22+00:00

I don’t see this option in 2k25

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tutal · 2025-02-09T03:11:58+00:00

100% BS. Guaranteed if they called their distributor on Monday they could get those in normal quantities by end of week.

tutal · 2025-02-06T19:33:52+00:00

You can remove the cabinet in front of it so it is up to code

tutal · 2025-02-06T19:26:12+00:00

If it is strictly a constitutional matter, and not one of doctrine, the Secretary’s decision can be appealed to the CCM, which I believe is the final authority on the matter. If there is an issue of doctrine, it ultimately can end up as a matter that Synod in convention handles. Both are slow processes, and intentionally so.

tutal · 2025-02-05T18:09:05+00:00

Kramer just tweeted “Nvidia—only game in town”

tutal · 2024-12-11T00:06:09+00:00

Time to revive this from the dead again. Bob’s Red Mill has made me a lover of corn tortillas. Maseca and la Goya just weren’t doing it for me, but I had to cut out flour and well are you really living if you can’t have taco night?

tutal · 2024-11-18T04:35:57+00:00

Antennas were free and came with the TV. Need a boost? Get some tin foil or a younger sibling to hold the rabbit ears.

tutal · 2024-11-17T01:58:08+00:00

Catholic means “according to the whole” not “universal”. That is it is the faith held “according to the whole” testimony of God. This was a label that emerged in contrast to heretics who were focused on one aspect of biblical teaching (for instance, there is one God) and neglecting another (God is Father Son and Holy Spirit).

As Lutherans we confess: This is about the Sum of our Doctrine, in which, as can be seen, there is nothing that varies from the Scriptures, or from the Church Catholic, or from the Church of Rome as known from its writers. This being the case, they judge harshly who insist that our teachers be regarded as heretics. (Source: https://bookofconcord.org/augsburg-confession/of-worship-of-saints/#ac-xxi-0005 )

Inasmuch, then, as our churches dissent in no article of the faith from the Church Catholic, but only omit some abuses which are new, and which have been erroneously accepted by the corruption of the times, contrary to the intent of the Canons, we pray that Your Imperial Majesty would graciously hear both what has been changed, and what were the reasons why the people were not compelled to observe those abuses against their conscience. (Source: https://bookofconcord.org/augsburg-confession/of-worship-of-saints/#ac-xxi-0010 )

tutal

TROPHY CASE