Outside the church, i.e., outside the visible, organized Christ-confessing covenant community, where the gospel is preached purely, the sacraments of Holy Baptism and the Lord’s Supper are administered purely, and where church discipline is used, the church often looks very different than . . . Continue reading →
Jesus reclines at the feast of Levi, and he is surrounded by more tax-collectors and sinners. He is keeping company with some bad folk. To be labeled a sinner was not to be socially misunderstood; it wasn’t an unfair prejudice against those . . . Continue reading →
Jesus did welcome and eat with sinners of various kinds. Some of them were gross sinners but he did not endorse their sin nor make them a “protected class.” He loved them and called them to faith and for all those whom the Father gave him he laid down his life. Continue reading →