My sermon this past Lord’s Day had two main points, both consisting of the exact same words: “Jesus is the Savior of sinners.” But for the first point I stressed the word “sinners”: Jesus is the Savior of sinners. And for the second point, I put the stress on the word “Savior”: Jesus is the…

Later this month we’ll celebrate (not Halloween, but) the 500th anniversary of the beginning of the Protestant Reformation. The catalyst for that great religious and social upheaval, the Augustinian monk Martin Luther, only found peace with God when he saw the truth in Scripture that our justification, or right standing, with God is by faith…

Luke in his Gospel tells us about an encounter between Jesus and a man who was stricken with what may have been the most dreadful affliction in New Testament times, leprosy. If we can assume Luke’s “leprosy” is the same as our “Hansen’s disease” (not a certainty since leprosy in the Scriptures includes a variety…