Good Friday 2026

Posted on April 3, 2026 by AngelsPortion

Here at Our Savior in Hartland, we spend Holy Monday, Holy Tuesday, and Holy Wednesday making our way through John 12:20-50. The context of the reading is Palm Sunday. It’s the Lord’s immediate beginnings in the temple after He entered the city to fast-fleeting fanfare. He’s there teaching.

We handle the reading in sections. Monday considers verses 20-36. Tuesday, we hear 37-43. On Wednesday, we digest 44-50. I’ve been doing it this way for a while. It works, if only because the Lord’s words here are wonderfully bottomless. And their point? His truest glory. His death on the cross for sinners.

Right now, I’m thinking about Tuesday’s reading. It ended with John telling us, almost in passing, that “many even of the authorities believed in Him, but for fear of the Pharisees they did not confess it, so that they would not be put out of the synagogue; for they loved the glory that comes from man more than the glory that comes from God” (vv. 42-43).

As a pastor, those words are familiar. I’m not trying to be negative. However, the plain truth is that there is a kind of belief that teeters dangerously at the edge of unbelief. John more or less describes it as the kind that never quite finds its voice, but instead, stays hidden. His words are a passing indictment of something that’s far more dangerous than we may realize.

Most often, we might assume things like open hostility to God’s Word or flat-out rebellion against this or that are the real dangers leading to unbelief. Maybe they’re the worst of the bunch. But they’re not the only pavers on the path to destruction. Some are much subtler. Here, John references the deadly nature of self-preserving hesitation. He describes the kind of faith that remains hidden because it’ll cost too much if it’s seen.

Today is Good Friday. Good Friday presses directly into that space. That’s because, regardless of those in the churches who’d prefer to keep the crucifixes hidden because they seem offensive, the fact is, the cross doesn’t allow for a private allegiance. It doesn’t leave room for a faith that exists only in the interior life, safely insulated from consequence. The crucifixion of Jesus was public. It was out in the open and very public.

That’s right where it belonged, making it, in every sense of the word, costly.

I think that’s the real reason some churches, even some here in my neighborhood, shrink from displaying crosses in their buildings—and why they jump from Palm Sunday straight to Easter, without even the slightest glance toward Good Friday. It’s not that they don’t believe. I won’t go that far. John was clear. They did believe. Something in them knew and recognized the Savior. Something in them was drawn to Him. But belief—the kind refusing to confess the glory Jesus had been describing all along—it began to bend. It began to accommodate. It learned how to survive without ever having to embrace Christ entirely. It might not be unbelief, but it’s really darn close.

“They loved the glory that comes from man more than the glory that comes from God.”

That’s the fault line right there. And it should sound familiar. It describes competing loves, and we all know that sensation. Jesus warned against this in the Sermon on the Mount. He preached, “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other” (Matthew 6:24).

But what does this look like in a practical sense? I already mentioned the churches near me that have openly expressed disdain for displaying crosses, one in particular having been quoted in a local newspaper a few years back. For the rest of us, the reasons are not far removed. Christ takes a back seat to the desire to be thought well of. He’s pushed aside by the instinct to remain inside the popular circle. We do quiet calculations that weigh what faithfulness might cost against what acceptance provides. And when those scales tip—even just a little—keeping quiet about our faith in Jesus begins to feel reasonable, or in certain circumstances, maybe even necessary.

“If they know, I’ll never get the promotion.”

Good Friday weeps over this reasoning even as it refuses to let it stand. Because on this day, the One in whom they believed is no longer teaching in parables or confounding His critics in the temple courts. He’s lifted up in the open. He’s stripped of all dignity before the crowds. He’s nailed to wood while the masses mock Him. He’s cast entirely from everyone and everything. He’s openly and publicly rejected by every man-made structure this world uses to define belonging. Indeed, it is as Isaiah foretold: “He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not” (Isaiah 53:3).

I know it couldn’t have been an easy scene. Of course some people hid their eyes from it. But that doesn’t change the fact that the crucifixion of Jesus was the “hour for the Son of Man to be glorified” (John 12:23), and that according to that hour, as Jesus continued, “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself” (v. 32). John explains, “He said this to show by what kind of death He was going to die” (v. 33).

The Christian Church has no more important day than today. Yes, the Resurrection is crucial. But in a sense, it’s proof of today’s significance. The crucifixion of Jesus is the moment of moments for the Christian faith. It’s where the Son of God exacted what was necessary for your salvation. And in that moment, every believer, open or hidden, is forced to reckon with something the world will never embrace. Behold what the Christian faith finds so beautiful! The death of God’s Son for me!

The devil hates everything about the crucifixion, most importantly, what it earned for us. He’d love for it to become something we avoid, interpreting it as little more than jewelry-worthy while, at the same time, convincing us to prefer a version of faith that never disrupts our place in the world.

As is often the case, the Bible provides real-life examples so we know better. John 12 is just such an example. Some of the Jewish authorities believed, but they stopped short of faith’s confession. And in stopping short, they forfeited something essential. Because faith that never speaks or moves or risks anything—it almost always conforms to the very pressures it fears. It becomes quiet enough to coexist. It remains safe enough to go unnoticed and, as a result, steps away from Christ’s insistence that believers have been recreated by faith as salt of the earth and lights in the world. Christ would have us as recognizable conduits—a means for the unbelieving world to see and meet Him and, ultimately, give glory to the Father in heaven (Matthew 5:13-16).

Good Friday stands entirely against the kind of belief John described—the kind that’s weak enough to disappear in every crowd. Again, John doesn’t scold it in his account. He simply presents it as a dangerous reality that we shouldn’t ignore, if only because the One preaching in the temple at that moment didn’t remain hidden to preserve His standing. He didn’t adjust His mission to avoid trouble. He embraced the hour of true glory—His death for sinners. And lest you doubt what I’ve said about the hour of His glorification being His death, read our Lord’s passionate announcement in verse 27: “Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? But for this purpose I have come to this hour.”

I suppose part of my point this morning is to invite you to step a little closer to the Lord’s hour. Go to church today. Make time—not as a formality, or as an obligation squeezed into an already crowded day—but as a deliberate act of open alignment. Ask your boss. Invite a friend. Make time and go to the place where so many others in your church family are going, a place where the cross is not background noise, but the central reality of the faith we are to live before others each and every day.

Today—especially today—go! Refuse to remain at a distance from what stands at the center of history. The intense Gospel rendering of this day strips away the lesser things you’re prone to holding onto, even the ridiculously simple things like the need for approval, the fear of exclusion, or the quiet compromises you’ve made to keep everything around you safely intact.

Let Good Friday interrupt you and give you something better. Let it press on you. Let it ask more of you than is comfortable. Let it show you more than what you’re willing to see.

If you don’t have a church home, or your church does not offer Good Friday services, I’m sorry. Rest assured, you’re welcome to join us here at Our Savior in Hartland. Our first Good Friday service, Tre Ore, is at 1:00 PM. The next, Tenebrae, is at 6:30 PM. I’m preaching at the 1:00 service. Our headmaster, Pastor Scheer, so graciously offered to help by preaching at the 6:30 PM service. Attending either or both, I promise you’ll be blessed with all that’s necessary for a faith that can stretch its legs beyond the borders of anything this world might call belonging.

But Then I Actually Thought About It…

Posted on March 22, 2026 by AngelsPortion

Saint Paul is the one who wrote, “The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost” (1 Timothy 1:15). The “foremost” of this saying applies to all, if only we’re willing to admit it. I can certainly share how easily it applied to me recently. I’m not afraid to tell you. I just preached a few weeks ago that repentance without confession is still sin in hiding.

This is my repentance coming out into the open.

Essentially, I was scrolling through Facebook. I noticed a photo, someone’s selfie with a friend. It was just a simple photo. Both in its frame were smiling widely, clearly enjoying the moment together. But the one taking the photo had something in his teeth. It wasn’t overwhelmingly obvious. However, it was noticeable enough to me. And so, now, my confession.

My first instinct was to chuckle and say to myself, “You might want to check your teeth before posting selfies.” And that, friends, is how easy it was for me to fall short.

I suppose the only upside to the response is that I restrained the urge to post what I was thinking. I could’ve done it. I could’ve justified it, too, believing I’d be preserving them from further ridicule, maybe giving them a chance to swap the photo with something else. It would have been easy enough to wiggle into that perspective.

But then, I actually thought about it. I didn’t just react. I thought. And the more I did, the more I looked at the image. And the more I looked at the image, the more obvious something else became. These two people weren’t posting a dental advertisement. They were sharing a moment of joy between them. They captured an image of friendship. And while I was busy capturing the flaw, they were busy demonstrating something so much better.

This is my sin. Not yours. Still, the overarching realization that occurred sheds light on the times in which we live. We live in a culture that has nudged us toward noticing the wrong thing first. Social media rewards it. News cycles feed off of it. Someone makes a mistake, says a clumsy word, posts an imperfect photo, and instantly, the comments fill with negative criticism. Everyone becomes a certified inspector of someone else’s flaws or understanding. Everyone becomes an expert in pointing out what someone didn’t get right or should have done better.

I’ve said it a thousand times that this is one of the worst parts about writing for public consumption. There’s always someone waiting in the wings to take what was meant for good and convert it into something dreadful. They’re lurking there, not to correct or improve what I’ve said, but to tear it down—to tear me down. It is almost reflexive now. People see before they think. They condemn before they understand. They correct before considering whether the correction is actually even necessary.

And sometimes the thing they miss is the very thing that mattered most in the first place.

I think that’s just one more reason why the season of Lent is so necessary. It’s not only about penitent postures relative to sin and, ultimately, the grace of our Savior who took those sins into and upon Himself, to free us from their decaying bondage. It’s also about the promised recalibration born from that wonderful Gospel. Lent, compared to all other Church seasons, is one where the Lord gently exposes the habits of the heart we barely notice anymore. Unfortunately, it seems far too many seem disinterested in Lent, even as it’s perfect for a social media world. It reveals the small reflexes of pride, the quiet hunger to appear clever, the subtle impulse to correct others rather than rejoice with them.

Lent slows us down long enough to actually see through the lens of the Gospel in some incredibly practical ways. Relative to the photo I mentioned, and as I hinted at before, social media prompts us to be clever when maybe we should be quiet and think. It prompts us for praise when what would better suit us is humble and thoughtful restraint. The good in the photo was obvious when I did that—when I stopped looking for the flaw and remembered my own failings. Now, through that lens, it was better seen as two friends enjoying life together. It was a small, happy moment, entirely undeserving of the conflict and criticism and outrage that social media demands we iterate over every ridiculous little thing.

And the thing is, I left that moment feeling better. That’s because faith’s choice is always so much better. Faith knew the better response in that situation was not to point out the speck in the guy’s teeth. The better response was simply to smile and be glad that joy still exists. Indeed, that’s one of the quiet disciplines of Lent. It’s a season for learning to see again. It helps us to see our own hearts honestly. It helps us to look upon our neighbors with charity. It absolutely helps us to see the good gifts of God that we too easily overlook when we are busy inspecting imperfections.

That said, you and I both know that the world already has enough critics. What it needs more are people who can bring the joy of Christ’s wonderful love into the darkness. And so, we do. We do it strengthened by faith’s humble repentance. We recognize that we, like Saint Paul, are the foremost of sinners in need of grace. Through that penitent lens, the landscape of God’s grace—all the undeserving joys He provides day in and day out—becomes far more visible through this world’s fog than the things that might bring sorrow. That’s because the grace of God has a way of reordering our sight.

When the Gospel steadies the heart, the flaws that once seemed so urgent lose their power to dominate the moment. That’s what repentance does. It doesn’t simply make us feel sorry for sin. It teaches us to see rightly again. It reminds us that the greatest flaw in the picture was never the thing in the guy’s teeth. The greatest flaw was the pride in my own heart that was so ready to point out what was really no big deal at all.

And that is exactly why Saint Paul’s words remain so trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance. Christ came into the world to save sinners. Not just the most scandalous among us. But sinners like me. Sinners like you, too. It’s far too easy for any and all of us to drift toward small cruelties we might otherwise excuse as harmless. Yet, Christ came for those, too. Even better, He came to bear the sins we barely notice and the sins we cannot forget.

Let my failure, no matter how insignificant it might seem, be today’s reminder.

Not Recording… But Recording

Posted on March 8, 2026 by AngelsPortion

The following has been on my mind for some time. I’ve only just now felt the urge to parse my thoughts. Essentially, Jennifer and I were sitting together and watching a news report on the Nancy Guthrie case a few weeks ago when something relatively small (but actually not very small at all) slipped into the host’s conversation.

Nancy Guthrie’s Ring Doorbell footage was playing on the screen. The suspect was visible, moving about the Guthrie porch area, doing what he could to cover the camera’s lens and then break into the home. At one point, Dan Bongino joined the broadcast. Bongino is the former Deputy Director of the FBI. The host and Bongino both commented on the FBI’s impressive technological capacity, how the Bureau likely had the tools to use the video’s contents to identify and track down the suspect, even though his face was covered by a ski mask.

But then came the statement that bothered me.

The show’s host mentioned that, even though the Ring Doorbell camera was turned off and not recording, the FBI was able to obtain the footage we were watching at that very moment, which was, in fact, stored at Google. Nothing was added to the comment. There was no explanation. No clarification. The conversation simply moved on.

I immediately turned to Jennifer and said, “Did you hear that? The camera wasn’t recording, but somehow the FBI was able to acquire recorded footage from Google’s servers.”

That detail, while it seemed to matter very little to the host or Bongino, has not left me. We are told our devices are dormant until activated. We have a Google Home device that sits quietly on a cabinet near our dining area. It’s not supposed to listen unless prompted with what’s called a “wake word,” and it’s not supposed to record until that wake word is used and the command to record is given. It’s certainly not supposed to store audio without our consent. Still, notice the logic. To hear a “wake word,” it has to be listening—always.

And so, the FBI obtained uninterrupted video footage from a Google device that wasn’t awake.

How many times has the Thoma family joked about this sort of thing? More than I can count. It’s become something of a running gag in our house. For example, if the kids are horsing around, poking fun at each other, mock-threatening in that exaggerated, theatrical way siblings do, someone might laugh and say, “I’m gonna murder you.” They all laugh. And yet, almost instantly, one of them will add, “In Minecraft.”

It’s reflexive now. The joke, of course, is that our Google device is always listening. So, if an algorithm somewhere flags the word murder, we quickly clarify that no actual murder is about to take place, but rather someone is going to get revenge in the blocky video game universe of Minecraft. The kids laugh, but they also qualify. They tease, but they also amend the record. And that’s the curious part for me. Again, we’ve been assured the device isn’t listening. And yet, here we are, instinctively adding digital disclaimers at dinner, as though an invisible guest might be taking notes.

But we have good reason to believe it’s happening. Maybe you’ve had the same experiences we’ve had. There’ve been times when we were discussing something obscure during dinner or while sitting around the corner on the couch—talking about something oddly specific—and moments later, we discovered advertisements or suggested articles or videos related to that very topic appearing in our feeds. No one looked anything up on the internet during the original discussion. No one shared a video link by text. We simply spoke. Then, suddenly, strangely, there was the topic of our discussion in digital form on all our phones.

We laugh and say, “Big Brother’s listening.” Maybe he is.

This also has me wondering out loud that if a Ring camera can be “not recording” and yet still have retrievable footage stored somewhere, what exactly does “not recording” mean? Technology companies use careful language. My guess is that “recording” may not mean what ordinary people think it means. In other words, maybe it means something other than the typical layman’s understanding of “on” and “off.” Whatever the definition might be, the former Deputy Director of the FBI just told me that federal investigators can, in fact, access recordings from a device that’s not recording. And they can use it against you.

I suppose for me, the question in that moment became something more like, “What’s the price I’m willing to pay for convenience—or personal safety?” I like the fact that we have cameras around the outside of our home. Writing for public consumption has proven the cameras necessary. But I also like the convenience of seeing that a package was delivered while I’m away. I like being able to adjust the thermostat from an app. I like calling out into the thin air, “Hey, Google, what’s the weather going to be like today?” even though I live in Michigan and I can pretty much guarantee it’s going to be cold.

But for all the things I might appreciate about technology, convenience and personal safety are rarely free, especially in the modern home. The modern home hums with interactive devices. I was at Home Depot a week or so ago and passed by a refrigerator with an interactive screen bigger than my desktop computer’s two monitors combined. And so, I suppose the question changes a little. I should probably be asking whether we understand the scope of what we’ve invited into our homes.

Having said all this, I’m not sure where to go next. Although I suppose Lent is an appropriate season for asking these kinds of questions, especially that last one.

Lent is a season of examination. The examination most certainly could reach into our digital habits. But in the end, its reach isn’t technological. It’s spiritual. Lent is in place to help us slow down. We quiet the world’s noise. We take inventory. We ask what has quietly crept into the house of our hearts and what’s humming in the background of our souls.

Sure, we worry about devices that are always listening. We joke about invisible listeners, and we clarify our ribbing jokes with “in Minecraft,” just in case. But God’s Word reminds us that there is, in fact, One who truly hears every word and knows everything about us. Read Psalm 139 if you don’t believe me. The first twelve verses will tell you everything you need to know:

“O Lord, you have searched me and known me! You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from afar. You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways. Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O Lord, you know it altogether. You hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high; I cannot attain it. Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there! If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me. If I say, ‘Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light about me be night,’ even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is bright as the day, for darkness is as light with you” (vv. 1-12).

What the Psalmist declared could be either terrifying or comforting. It’s terrifying if God is merely a cosmic surveillance system waiting to use our words against us—to capture us in wrongdoing and bring swift judgment. On the other hand, the Psalmist’s words are comforting if the One who hears and sees is also the One who went to the cross for every intentional or unintentional crime of thought, word, and deed we’ve ever committed (Matthew 12:36). In other words, the difference is the cross.

And that’s where Lent is taking us—to Good Friday’s holy massacre.

This world is an uneasy one. The assumption is that we’re being watched, not only by corporations and governments, but by sin, death, and the devil, forces far more formidable than the FBI. And yet, in the midst of these things, the Holy Spirit calls us by the Gospel to remember that we are seen fully by God—and loved and cared for still. The Lord who knows what is whispered in our dining rooms is the same Lord who bore our sin in His body on the cross. He does not need devices or algorithms to track us down. He certainly didn’t look upon His world with His first inclination being that it would only end in eternal imprisonment. His first response was love. His first response was rescue. His first response was to act. And so, He reached into this world personally. Through the person and work of Jesus Christ, God came down Himself.

Perhaps that’s the best direction to go with all of this. We fear unseen listeners in plastic devices sitting on shelves in our living spaces. And yet, the One who truly sees and hears us—the One who knows the worst that we are—was already there all along. Even better, He took upon Himself human flesh and joined us at the table. He wasn’t invisible. He was seen. He showed us just how much He cares. And now, through faith in His sacrifice—inevitably demonstrated through repentance, faith, and the amending of the sinful life—the verdict is declared to those who believe: Whatever you’ve done, it isn’t enough to condemn you. You are forgiven. And this happened in reality, not in Minecraft.

An Unforgettable Moment—State of the Union 2026

Posted on March 1, 2026 by AngelsPortion

Perhaps you had a chance to watch or listen to President Trump’s State of the Union speech last Tuesday. I didn’t watch the whole thing. I’d only just gotten home before it started, and the day had already been a long and exhausting one. Still, I watched until about 10:25 PM—and that was plenty.

Political speeches, especially Trump speeches, are rarely remembered for their eloquence, even when they’re chock full of accomplishments, policy prescriptions, and legislative ambitions. That said, I can’t think of another president I’ve enjoyed listening to more than Donald J. Trump. He can be quite funny. And not to mention, he’s fearless. He steers into things that few before him have been willing to offer even the slightest glance. I should add that when my family and I met him in person, on my daughter Evelyn’s birthday, no less, he was the kindest and most genuine politician I’d ever met. He already knew it was her birthday before we walked in, and even as the Secret Service reminded us before entering that the visit would be quick—and not to touch him—he saw us enter and reached out to us, even hugging Evelyn. He took time with us, asking us questions. He shook my hand and described the pastoral office with great respect. He didn’t have to do any of those things. But he did. That’s because he’s that kind of person.

“Still, how can you admire this crass man? And you call yourself a Christian pastor!”

My first reaction to statements like that is to say I’m friends with lots of folks the perfect humans among us might be inclined to call imperfect. My second thought is to say, be careful not to fall into what has become a rather tired pitfall. I did not choose Donald Trump to be my pastor. I voted for him to be my president, and God’s Word draws a clear distinction between the roles of civil authority and spiritual shepherds. As I’ve noted on countless occasions, if I were ever on trial for murder, I’d want the best lawyer defending me, not the most pious Christian. Saint Paul teaches that governing authorities are instituted by God to “bear the sword” and to punish wrongdoing and promote civil order—a function of justice, not pastoral care (Romans 13:1-4). By contrast, 1 Peter 5:2-3 and Ephesians 4:11-12 describe pastors as shepherds who oversee souls, teach sound doctrine, and equip the saints for ministry. And of course, Jesus says, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s” (Matthew 22:21). When He did this, at a minimum, He affirmed distinct spheres of responsibility. Both are established and ordained by God, and so, in that sense, they’re not absolutely divided. They’re designed to cooperate. Nevertheless, the plain structure is that civil leaders are accountable for governance and public order, while pastors are accountable for spiritual oversight. The offices are different by divine design.

But now, before I wander too far from what I intended to say, regardless of the politician giving any particular speech, most of what anyone says tends to fade almost immediately into the churn of news cycles and partisan rebuttals. What sticks are the moments—scripted or unscripted—that cut through the usual political theater, giving way to actual revelation. There was one particular moment during Tuesday’s address that stood apart for me. It proved Trump’s prowess. And for the hundreds of millions around the world watching the speech, it pared away any obscurities, leaving only the unmistakable mineral differences between two very different ideological positions.

When the president asked members of Congress to stand if they believed the primary responsibility of government is to protect American citizens before illegal aliens, the chamber responded immediately. A very simple question elicited a whole-body posture, a “yes” or “no” response that couldn’t be hidden.

Republicans rose instantly at the question, their applause swelling into a prolonged ovation that lasted several minutes. Across the aisle to their left, Democrats remained seated. Some scowled. A few shouted. Others mocked or gestured dismissively as the applause continued around them. The contrast couldn’t have been sharper. I turned to Jennifer and said, “There you have it. There’s no hiding from that. That’ll be remembered.”

Standing in support or sitting in protest during the State of the Union speech is normal. Trump used that practice, ultimately handing control of the rostrum over to the whole room, inviting everyone to state their most fundamental ideology concerning government. Who is it principally for? And the whole room answered. At that moment, the division was no longer theoretical. It wasn’t buried beneath news reporters asking the same question, only to receive rambling responses designed to avoid it entirely, lest the one being questioned offend the extremists in their party. Stand if you think the American government is in place to serve Americans before illegal aliens. Sit if you don’t.

The Republicans stood. The Democrats remained seated.

In the end, that was an important moment, if only because, as I said, almost any disagreement, whether it’s political, theological, financial, or whatever, is quite often softened by language designed to obscure fundamental differences. Competing parties frequently claim identical ends while disputing only means. Relative to what’s happening in our country right now, the rule of law, compassion, justice, and fairness are words claimed by pretty much everyone. But the varying sides understand those words differently. That all disappeared when Trump put the stand-or-sit challenge before the chamber. He cut straight through to the heart of the definitions in a way that the disagreement could no longer be about strategy or implementation. It was about first principles—who the American government is actually established to serve.

This exposed the deeper moral framework. For one side, prioritizing citizens represents the foundational duty of national sovereignty, which is one of the most basic justifications for the existence of the state itself. The other side openly refused to endorse this premise. And now, the differing postures formed an image that’s not going to fade from America’s memory anytime soon. Americans witnessed the divide. This time it had handles. It was no longer hidden behind nuance. It no longer rested comfortably behind mere policy preferences, as if both Republicans and Democrats want the same things, they’re just using different pathways to get there. Nope. The divide stems from fundamentally different understandings of the government’s moral priorities.

The whole country saw this ideological landscape mapped in real time.

In the end, like every other speech that’s ever been given, this one will be mostly analyzed for its claims and proposals. I don’t know about you, but on my part, I usually forget what the talking heads eventually end up scrutinizing. What I don’t forget are the images—the memorable moments I can visualize. I was only sixteen years old, but I can still remember watching the exchange between Lloyd Bentsen and Dan Quayle when, after Quayle compared himself to JFK, Bentsen retorted something like, “Senator, I served with Jack Kennedy, I knew Jack Kennedy. Senator, you are no Jack Kennedy.” I can safely say I knew very little about either candidate at the time. But it was a moment, for sure. And combined with the ruckus that followed, that moment defined the entire memory. Everything else has since faded.

The same kind of moment happened on Tuesday night. Years from now, few will remember the statistics cited or the priorities outlined. But many will remember that chamber—half standing, half seated—answering a relatively simple challenge without words, and in doing so revealing something far more enduring than differing points of view. It revealed, plainly and permanently, what each side believes the United States government exists to do—and whom its elected officials are in place to serve. I sense that many saw this clearly, especially folks who tend to exist in the middle on so many important issues, and now that they have, it’ll be really hard for the usual suspects to pretend they didn’t see it.

Shining Truth’s Light is Never a Bad Idea

Posted on February 22, 2026 by AngelsPortion

Have you seen the image circulating online that attributes a shocking confession to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi? I have. When I saw it, I had to start searching. I wanted to know whether she really said it and, if so, what the context was.

The quotation was, “If we prosecute everyone in the Epstein files, the whole system collapses.” Again, I searched. There is absolutely no evidence that she ever said this. That matters, and it’s important to say so plainly. Things like this corrode trust, whether it comes from liberal or conservative sources.

That said, the idea embedded in the statement certainly does raise questions worth examining on their own terms. Suppose, purely hypothetically, everyone connected to wrongdoing in the Epstein files was teed up for prosecution. That most certainly would include a large number of people within powerful networks of influence. Personally, I say, get the tees and let’s get this party started. But what about the supposed system collapse? Is this spirit of concern similar to the government’s refusal to let General Motors go under back in 2008, insisting it was too big to fail, lest countless lives be destroyed? What would collapse actually look like or mean, and would it be a good or bad thing?

The point here is that the statement really does dig into a strata that’s deeper than any one person. The assumption is that it intersects with the very nature of institutions themselves. In other words, when people speak about the “system,” they rarely mean a single organization, like GM alone. They mean a web of relationships. They mean the Big Three and all the downstream suppliers. Relative to Epstein, they mean political structures, legal frameworks, media institutions, financial networks, and all the unseen relationships, good or bad, that link them all together.

In its purest sense, when acting according to its divine ordination, the “system” is in place to serve the citizenry (Romans 13:3-4). It preserves order and maintains justice. It makes sure that the courts function as they should. It ensures that laws are enforced. It keeps everyone, even the most powerful, within the same boundaries that encircle the rest of us.

But it’s pretty obvious that systems can drift. I’ve seen it firsthand, even as recently as yesterday. Over time, incentives change the nature of friendships. Goals become more valuable than truth. Narratives become more important than integrity. In some cases, the preservation of the system itself begins to take priority over the principles that justified its existence in the first place.

When that happens, the system is no longer doing what it was designed to do. It becomes less about society’s well-being and more of a self-protective, leapfrogging competition for individuals to reach the top of the food chain. In that type of system, it becomes necessary to shield wrongdoing, and the logic behind the shielding almost always becomes something like, “If we expose the wrongdoing, the damage will be too great, and the system will come undone.”

But this reasoning has hidden assumptions. In one sense, it assumes that the system, if only because it’s the best system the world has ever known, deserves to be maintained. In another sense, it assumes that if the system is allowed to continue, some wrongdoing is tolerable among those at the helm, so long as the machinery keeps running and the outward forms of stability remain intact.

I’m a huge fan of liberty, which means the first sense is immediately rejected. Indeed, the framework of our constitutional republic is the best system this world has ever seen, and it deserves to be maintained. It’s the second assumption that troubles me. It’s the one that quietly shifts the definition of justice from something principled to something negotiated. It suggests that not only are there thresholds of wrongdoing we are willing to overlook, but also categories of people who operate under softer rules, and that their preservation is somehow a higher good than truth (Deuteronomy 1:17 and James 2:1,9).

I mentioned a few weeks back that the reason my Ashes To Ashes book has resonated with so many is that, in a way, it understands the frustration among the citizenry when this becomes the accepted standard. This feeling absolutely meets with the Epstein files. Young girls were trafficked and abused by the seemingly untouchable among us. We’ve known this for years now. And still, not one person, other than Ghislaine Maxwell, has been brought to justice. There are names behind those redaction marks. Law enforcement knows who they are. But here we sit. Of course, some would say Prince Andrew was brought to justice. But it wasn’t for anything I just mentioned. He was charged with sharing government information with Epstein, even though all of it happened within the darker context of sexual deviancy with underage girls.

I’m not so sure a free society can long survive this obvious discrepancy. Liberty depends on trust that the law applies equally, that wrongdoing is answerable, and that justice is more than a slogan carved in stone above a courthouse door. The moment people begin to suspect that some are shielded while others are exposed, the real damage has already begun. The machinery may still run, the institutions may still stand, but the confidence that gives them legitimacy is starting to turn to ash. And once that foundation gives way, no system, no matter how carefully constructed, can stand for long.

As Americans, we’ve all learned the principle that justice must be impartial. If we didn’t learn it in school, then there’s a good chance we learned it in real time, or at a minimum, by watching a cop show. Either way, the point is that justice does not bend for the powerful while remaining hard and fast against the rest of us. When it does work that way, the plain truth is that justice ceases to be justice at all.

So, Pastor Thoma, what are you recommending?

Well, essentially, I guess what I’m saying is that I wonder how shining the light of truth on anything could ever be a bad idea. I don’t believe for one second that the system would collapse if all the redactions were removed. I’ve never known truth to collapse what’s good—and America’s system is just that. Instead, truth exposes what’s broken, making repair a possibility (Ephesians 5:13). That’s always a good thing. And so, my point. Whatever is broken in the system, if it’s truly worth preserving, the truth will find and make it possible to refine it, not destroy it. If parts of it cannot survive truth’s light, then perhaps those are the very parts that should not survive at all.

No matter who they are, bring the people in the Epstein files to justice. Period. America will be fine. In fact, America will be the better for it. Nothing good comes from protecting anyone from accountability. That should already make perfect sense to Christians. We know what God’s Law does. We know it’s an expression of His love (Hebrews 12:6 and Proverbs 3:11-12). He’s loving us when He says, “Don’t do that! It’s bad for you!” With God’s loving warning, the perpetrator is given the opportunity to repent and amend—to steer away from destruction’s cliff.

But what if God didn’t care enough to do this? In a practical sense, we all know that parent whose kid can do no wrong. No matter what the kid does, the parent always excuses the crime. That’s a kid who only ever gets worse. That’s a kid who’s destined to go over the cliff eventually.

I suppose societies aren’t so different. A society that excuses wrongdoing in the name of preserving itself is not preserving anything, except maybe its decay. A homeowner who kills all the cockroaches but turns a blind eye to the carpenter ants will eventually learn what that means. Decay, no matter how carefully managed, always ends in collapse.

Surely This Must Be Satire

Posted on February 15, 2026 by AngelsPortion

I’ve seen a few letters circulating from local school districts about student walkouts protesting ICE. Beyond our own communities’ borders, there’ve been other stories and accompanying images about students pouring out of school buildings, holding signs, chanting slogans, and presenting themselves as voices for compassion and justice.

At first glance, these walkouts—misspelled signs and all—can seem admirable to some, maybe even virtuous. I’ve read plenty of comments from folks in various Linden forums praising the students for exercising their right to protest. That said, there are plenty of others in those forums tippety-tapping my thoughts, making it so I don’t have to write a single word. On my part, I’m not convinced a majority of the participating students actually understand or even care about the actual protest itself, if only because there are so many reports of kids joining them just to skip school. Some of the parents in one particular forum admitted as much, saying their kids flat out told them they see it as a way to take a day off.

Still, I’m sure some sincerely believe they are standing up for people being mistreated. But even with that, I’m in relative disagreement. Apart from the fact that the events in Minnesota gave birth to the walkouts—and it’s only after $9 billion in fraud was discovered in the Somali community, thereby serving as the perfect, all-encompassing distraction—the whole situation has been framed entirely by emotion. There isn’t a single thing about it that suggests actual thought. It has “knee-jerk” in its soul. And if there’s one thing I know for sure, it’s that people have always been drawn to causes framed in emotional language—most especially youth.

When I say emotional language, I mean just that. Even the forum commentary surrounding all of this was perpetually framed in simple emotional terms. It was stuff like compassion versus cruelty, inclusion versus exclusion, justice versus oppression. These are powerful categories, and they resonate emotionally. And yet, the reality of immigration policy, law enforcement, and perhaps most importantly, national sovereignty, is far more complex than a misspelled protest sign allows.

The plain fact is that a nation, like pretty much anything, cannot function without order. Laws exist not merely to punish but to create stability and fairness. When students walk out of school to protest the enforcement of existing laws, they might “feel” they are expressing compassion or inclusion. But what are they doing implicitly? They’re arguing that the law itself should be disregarded when its necessary enforcement becomes uncomfortable.

But again, all of that said, I remain unconvinced that most of the students participating in these protests are even capable of reaching that conclusion without some help, which I assume the teachers and administrators who appear to be egging them on are disinterested in providing. I read one comment from a teacher implying that it brings her joy to see her students embrace anything that stands against Donald Trump.

That’s not helping students think through complex issues. That’s not teaching. That’s propagandizing. That’s the imposition of ideology.

Now, I’m not saying all protests are inherently bad. I stopped shopping at Target when they started letting men use the women’s restrooms. When they corrected course, I returned. But what I am saying is that public demonstrations—the kinds with people holding signs and marching and shouting—they are, by design, built on emotion. There’s no room for discussion or reflection in such demonstrations. The loudest voices, the most extreme slogans, and the simplest narratives that can be repeated as mantras tend to dominate. All nuance disappears. The quiet but necessary work of examining—of learning, reasoning, and weighing competing ideas is replaced entirely by chanting and the inevitable social media applause.

Which makes student walkouts like these somewhat satirical.

First of all, a human brain isn’t even fully developed until the mid-twenties. There are plenty of studies about how cognitive capability is inhibited until that point. So, my point about these kids not understanding what they’re doing remains fixed. I suppose secondly, education is meant to form the mind. Assuming a school is actually doing this, when students leave classrooms to protest rather than study, they are, by default, putting aside the very tools they need to grow into thinkers who understand the world they hope to change.

Notice I prefaced by saying “assuming a school is actually doing this.” There’s a reason homeschooling and classical/parochial education are booming right now. The modern American education system seems incapable of fulfilling its charter, especially given the results. America’s scores, compared to those of other countries, prove we are no longer leaders of the intellectual pack. But we’ve mastered gender confusion. We’ve graduated to “2+2=4” being racist. We most certainly excel at woke, and we’ve become top-tier engineers of Marxism-inspired social justice.

I suppose this stirs the question of responsibility. Schools are not ideological training camps. At least they’re not supposed to be. I suppose in their mineral form, they’re institutions entrusted with preparing young people for adulthood. One of the most important skills students must develop is the ability to think critically and to act responsibly as adults. When a school’s leadership allows a walkout—or worse, fosters and praises it—at a minimum, it risks teaching that obligations and responsibilities can be set aside whenever a person feels like it. That is not a lesson that serves students well in the long run.

For example, if I, as a parent, allowed my daughter to skip school or basketball practice because she felt more like going shopping, I would be teaching her that commitments are conditional and responsibilities are negotiable. I’d be setting her up to fail as an adult.

In adult life, obligations rarely disappear simply because you’d rather be doing something else. Learning to weigh convictions, fulfill duties, and perhaps, as it meets with these walkouts, to choose appropriate times and means to make one’s voice heard is part of becoming a mature and responsible person. Regardless of whether we like it, the fact remains that schools share in the task of teaching that lesson.

I guess what I’m saying is that any student who walks out should be treated the same way any other student who leaves school without permission is treated. The absence should be marked unexcused, missed work should have to be made up according to school policy, and whatever ordinary disciplinary measures apply—detention or suspension or whatever—should be imposed consistently. Rule enforcement like this does not mean administrators are cruel or that students should be forbidden from having opinions. To believe otherwise is to let one’s emotions steer. The lesson is that rules are important, and they only mean something when they are applied evenly.

The unfortunate thing is that many schools wouldn’t even consider doing this. And why? Because they’d become living contradictions. From what I’ve read, it sure seems that a significant number of teachers and administrators want the kids to protest. They want them to embrace progressive ideologies and demonstrate adjacent behavior. Holding them to school policies, especially in this instance, risks accidentally teaching that law enforcement is, at its core, about the rule of law. A school cannot function if its rules are treated as suggestions, obeyed only when convenient, and ignored when they aren’t. By holding students accountable to the school’s own rules, educators would be demonstrating how a lawful system—whether a classroom, entire school, or much larger society—is actually supposed to work.

Concerning immigration laws and ICE’s enforcement of them, they risk accidentally teaching that a school—or nation—that does not enforce its laws should not expect to remain for long.

Time Travel in the Bible?

Posted on February 13, 2026 by AngelsPortion

I’m so incredibly exhausted by the world’s news cycles. Each new day brings a brand new insanity. So, here’s the thing. How about we just swim around in our own weirdness as Christians for a moment? Here’s what I mean.

For starters, I’m only late to this topic for those who follow the historic lectionary, which we do here at Our Savior. For everyone else in the liturgical community, the Transfiguration of Our Lord will likely be celebrated this Sunday. The next stop—Ash Wednesday.

I suppose another reason I say I’m late to this discussion is that after worship here at Our Savior three weeks ago, during the Adult Bible Study hour, I shared a thought I had while preaching on the text for Transfiguration Sunday from Matthew 17:1-9. Yes, it landed on me in the middle of the sermon. It didn’t make it into the sermon. But it certainly was rattling around in my brain. Essentially, I wondered whether it might be plausible that Moses and Elijah, the two patriarchs who stood and spoke with Jesus on the mountain, were actually stepping into that moment from moments in their own time.

I shared that thought with the adults in the Bible study. However, I never finished the thought. And so, this is it.

Typically, the moment Moses and Elijah arrive is interpreted as a visit from heaven. But the whole thing seems almost too dense for that simple deduction. I mean, if this is merely a visit from heaven, even just to serve as witnesses, why does the moment feel so heavy with the entire history of divine revelation? I know it’s not a good idea to form theological positions from speculation. However, I guess what I’m wondering about is not merely what happened, but how deep the event actually runs into the fabric of the Old Testament accounts. When Moses and Elijah appear with Jesus on the mountain, is something more taking place? Is time and space converging? Is it possible that when Moses and Elijah encountered God in the Old Testament, they were, in one or more of those moments, actually meeting with Christ in the Transfiguration moment? Is this something that—not merely theologically, but actually—is a binding moment that shows the simultaneous reaching backward and forward of redemptive history? Christianity teaches that such things are true. But is it being demonstrated in the Transfiguration?

I know it might sound like a huge waste of time to some. Still, the New Testament provides the necessary theological foundation for at least asking the question. Saint John writes pretty plainly, “No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known” (John 1:18). Christ Himself says, “Not that anyone has seen the Father except he who is from God” (John 6:46). And yet, the Old Testament repeatedly describes Moses, Elijah, and others as truly encountering God—speaking with Him, seeing His glory, standing in His presence. What’s more, the Church has historically resolved this tension by confessing that all visible manifestations of God in the Old Testament are manifestations of the pre-incarnate Son. In other words, whenever God shows Himself to anyone, Christ is the One they see. One of my favorite professors, Rev. Dr. Charles Gieschen, has written a crisp resource that leans into this kind of stuff. His book Angelomorphic Christology: Antecedents & Early Evidence, while thickly academic, is great fun.

In the meantime, these things place Moses’ experience on Sinai in an entirely new light—no pun intended. Exodus 33:11 tells us that “the Lord used to speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend,” and yet moments later, Moses is told that no one can see God’s face and live. The paradox only resolves if the One Moses encountered was truly divine, yet not the invisible Father in His fullness.

Something similar happens with Elijah’s encounter at Horeb. The prophet stands on the mountain as the Lord moves by, accompanied by wind, earthquake, and fire, yet is finally revealed as God speaking to Him in a quiet voice (1 Kings 19). The text uses the same language of divine self-disclosure found in Moses’ encounter—“the Lord passed by”—and, like Moses, Elijah returns from the mountain back into historical time, commissioned once again for his prophetic task of preaching a faithful Word. Like the scene with Moses, though happening at different times, this one includes the mountain, the divine glory, the overshadowing presence. Once again, the Transfiguration account begs the same question—if no one has seen the Father, who was Elijah encountering?

I don’t want to force anything into this. Eisegesis is dangerous. Still, the Transfiguration itself seems almost designed to invite a deeper investigation.

Another quick thing… Saint Luke’s version of the Transfiguration account tells us that Moses and Elijah speak with Jesus about His ἔξοδον—literally, His “exodus”—which He is about to accomplish at Jerusalem (Luke 9:31). First of all, the disciples weren’t invited into this discussion. He was talking to Moses and Elijah. Second, this isn’t casual vocabulary that Luke used. Moses’ entire ministry is defined by the Exodus. And Elijah stands at the head of the prophetic tradition that would proclaim what the Exodus was all about—calling Israel back to the covenant, confronting false worship, and insisting that the God who delivered His people is the same God who remains faithful to the end. And both Moses and Elijah are, right now, on the mountain with Jesus, talking about the fulfillment of everything they were commissioned to enact or proclaim.

Well, okay, one more quick thing. Did Jesus wink toward the possibility of the kind of collapse of linear time that I’m talking about when He said to the Pharisees in John 8:56, “Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day. He saw it and was glad.” Not merely believed it, but that he saw it. I think Hebrews echoes this too when it says that the faithful of old did not receive the promise apart from us, because their perfection awaited Christ (Hebrews 11:39-40). Their story was never complete in their own time. It awaited His appearing.

In the end, is any of this provable in a strict sense? Nope. Not at all. Scripture never explicitly states that Moses was temporally present at the Transfiguration while also standing temporally on Sinai, or that Elijah consciously stepped into a future moment with Christ while at Horeb. But as I said, I thought about this right in the middle of my sermon on the Transfiguration, and this morning I decided to have a little fun with it, especially since I left it hanging during Bible study a few weeks ago.

I suppose, through all of this, regardless of the theological wandering, we did land on something the Bible establishes pretty firmly. It’s something that the dispensationalists may want to keep in mind. Essentially, all divine self-revelation is Christological, all theophany is mediated by the Son, and all redemptive moments converge in Him. Time in Scripture is not merely sequential. It’s centered—situated entirely in Jesus. You cannot be God’s people apart from Christ, who was, is, and will always be.

So, before the private messages start arriving, calling me crazy or saying I have too much time on my hands (which I absolutely don’t), I suppose the safest and most faithful way to close up shop on this is not in terms of literal time travel, but in terms of unveiled continuity. When Moses and Elijah encountered God in the Old Testament, they encountered Christ, though they did not yet know Him as Jesus of Nazareth. In other words, while Moses and Elijah were there at the Transfiguration, no matter where they came from, they weren’t visiting with someone or something new. They were visiting with the same One they’d been with during their own theophanies in their own time.

In that sense, even the Transfiguration becomes less about Moses and Elijah showing up, as if they’re appearing to the disciples alongside Jesus, and more about Jesus appearing as He is to and with Moses, Elijah, Peter, James, and John—with an element of enlisting the new guys into the same company that has always stood before Him, now finally seeing Him without the veil.

And so, however you feel about what I’ve written this morning, rest assured, it was a far better way to spend my morning than simmering in everything else going on in the world. Although the student walkouts deserve some consideration. Maybe I’ll be “unexhausted” enough to think about those things for my regular eNews message this Sunday.

I’ll Never Leave, Even When I Do

Posted on February 8, 2026 by AngelsPortion

The only thing I have to share this morning is gratitude for the congregation I serve.

I’ll start by saying something that most who follow me already know. I despise Michigan’s climate. I despise the long gray months. Right about this time, rest assured, I’ve already lost all patience for the Michigan cold that seems to settle into my body, making it ache in far too many places. I just told Jennifer on Thursday morning that I despise the way winter in Michigan overstays its welcome, and that, for me, spring and summer feel more like rumors native Michiganders recall from ages past than experiences they actually have each year. Truly, if geography were the only factor for my presence here, I would have departed years ago for someplace warmer, brighter, and far less committed to seasonal suffering.

And yet, I will never leave. I say that knowing the paradoxical nature of the sentence, because I eventually will leave. You can count on it. But the thing is, even if I leave, I’ll never be gone. Not really. That’s because I love Our Savior Evangelical Lutheran Church and School in Hartland, Michigan—the congregation I’ve been blessed to serve since the very beginning of my pastoral ministry. I’ve been the pastor here for almost twenty years now. Even after I eventually retire and find a little place in Florida (or wherever Jen agrees to settle) with a few nearby palm trees adorning a no-big-deal pool, this will remain my real home—the penultimate gathering of a family I love so very much. And I do mean penultimate. It’s second only to heaven.

I could spend all morning telling you why I feel this way. And you know I could, too. You know I’m a wordy guy. Trust me when I say that twenty years of service in this place have not gone by unnoticed. It’s a very “real” community in every sense of the term. It’s by no means a bunch of folks gathered around a religious product designed to scratch their itching ears (1 Timothy 4:3). It’s a living body—Christ’s body—made of real people bound together by Word and Sacrament ministry, and standing beside one another in both a common need and a common confession.

It might sound strange at first, but I love that this is a congregation that knows how to struggle. Trust me when I say that we’ve endured some really tough times. And regardless of those who’ve since departed our humble confines, offering dire predictions on the way out door, this congregation remains, and continues to do so, having never forfeited its soul.

That said, I can promise you, there are stories in these pews that could humble even the most fearless. They’re stories of extreme betrayal and massive loss. But they’re also ones that sing a perpetual song of hopefulness—of fortitude, and of repentance and faith. They’re the kinds of tales that cost something very real but were sung anyway.

That’s because life together here at Our Savior has never been about the absence of pain. It’s about Christ and His ever-present mercy. When that’s the heart of a congregation, its pulse can only ever remain steady. It can only ever keep a confident tempo through both comfort and discomfort.

When I see this in real time—when I’m really paying attention—I realize I’m seeing real Christians, not performing what they believe, but living it. And they’re doing so sincerely, without getting duped by some disrupter’s false narrative. I’m surrounded by people who really are looking for and trusting what’s true—trusting that God is at work, even when it seems like the evidence for continuing with Him in the work is pretty thin.

In fact, just recently, I was reminded of how visible that faithfulness actually is. Our Savior was harshly criticized online several weeks ago for the way our security team diligently protects this place. Let the reader understand. We have a school. We do not take unexpected presences and questionable actions lightly. And we will do what’s necessary to protect the innocent among us. Add to that, even more recently, we endured more online venom for what we believe, teach, and confess concerning our funeral practices. A non-member family was somewhat peeved that we would not accommodate each and every detail they required. We will help however we can. However, Our Savior in Hartland is not a religious fast-food restaurant. You cannot stop in to order up a baptism, wedding, funeral, or whatever. Again, let the reader understand.

Indeed, the world’s viciously ignorant comments can sting on occasion, even when you expect them. Nevertheless, these moments are always extraordinarily clarifying for me, if only because they remind me of something important.

A congregation that takes both truth and responsibility seriously is bound to draw criticism from a world that finds them offensive or inconvenient. And far from discouraging me, the hateful comments only deepened my gratitude as the pastor of a congregation willing to be misunderstood and thoroughly misrepresented by the world rather than be found unfaithful to its Savior. This congregation knows that caving to the culture is never the better choice. Holding to faithfulness is always best, even when it means being insulted, or, perhaps worse, being painted unfairly before onlookers.

I suppose from another perspective, I love this congregation because it has taught me what pastoral ministry actually is. Yes, the seminary is good for this, too. Peter Scaer wrote a piece last week about the cruciality of seminary training. He’s right, it’s essential. But it’s here in the trenches that you learn what being a pastor is really all about. You learn it alongside God’s people in hospital rooms and at kitchen tables. I just experienced this with a friend on Thursday, a member of this congregation I truly adore. Even as we rejoiced together in Word and Sacrament, we sat and talked about anything and everything before she left for a medical appointment. That’s what family does.

I love this congregation because it has allowed me into these spaces, and in doing so, they’ve shown me what it means to stand in the stead and by the command of Christ more clearly than any book or classroom ever could.

From that vantage point, I could never see my job here as some sort of professional assignment from the seminary placement office. Concordia Theological Seminary in Fort Wayne, my alma mater, did a wonderful job in this regard. I was taught to know these moments are so much more. This is where I’ve been called. I belong to this place. And in that belonging, I have found not only my vocation—what God had in store for me long before I ever knew what I wanted for myself—but also a deep and enduring gratitude for the people who “are” the place in which I eventually ended up. They remind me each and every day of the week why the Church, even when it’s fumbling through life in general, will always be one of God’s most gentle and enduring gifts to the world.

I love Our Savior Evangelical Lutheran Church and School in Hartland, Michigan. I love the people. I love being called their pastor. I love the work, even though, as I already said, it can get choppy. And I suppose by choppy, I mean personally challenging, too, even to the point of mental and emotional fracture. But again, I’m with family. That can happen in a family. Still, I can promise you that I love this place and the work the Lord entrusted to me here. He put me squarely in the middle of people who confess Christ—who show up when it would be easier to stay home, who know the seriousness of engaging with the surrounding world, and who keep praying and trusting through it all.

There is a kind of demonstrated holiness in that persistence, one that shows the ordinary rhythm of the Christian life.

That’s Our Savior in Hartland, Michigan. That’s my church. Well, not my church. She’s the Lord’s church. And I’m blessed to be a part of it. And as I said at the beginning, no matter where I exist physically, Our Savior in Hartland, Michigan, will always be my home. It will always be my family.

I suppose that’s my simplest confession this morning. Indeed, when it comes to the weather, I’d much rather live anywhere else but Michigan. And yet, I thank God for placing me here. This is where He wants me, and that’s more than enough for me to want to be here, too.

And if I may add one final word, especially for my fellow pastors who might read what I’ve written here. Feel free to say this kind of thing out loud to your own people on occasion. Don’t assume they already know it. Don’t wait for anniversaries or crises or your eventual retirement sermon. Tell them you love them right now. Tell them you’re grateful. Tell them what it means not only to be the one called to serve them, but what it means to stand alongside them in the same need for Word and Sacrament. Tell them you appreciate all the little moments that’ll never be remembered in detail just as much as the ones that’ll make your monthly newsletter’s front page. Certainly, it’s the pastor’s job to tell the people in his care that Christ loves them—and what a privilege it is! But it’s also a pretty great thing to tell them how much you love them, too. I’m guessing it probably matters more than most realize.

Will the Modern American Church Survive?

Posted on February 1, 2026 by AngelsPortion

It’s becoming harder to pretend that things out there aren’t coming apart at the seams. I mean, people are no longer joking about civil war. Some commentators and podcasters have already jumped ahead to predicting how such a war would end. Of course, the media continues doing its part to up the ante.

CNN admitted last week that it adjusted Alex Pretti’s image to make him look more attractive in order to stir sympathy for his death. CNN also had to backtrack after leaving out that Pretti had initiated a violent interaction with ICE a week earlier, resulting in broken ribs. In other words, federal agents already knew Pretti. They knew he was dangerous. And so, when he leaned into the officers that day, when he pushed into them, when he spit on them as they tried to get away from him and into their vehicles (as the videos show), and when he ultimately died in the scuffle, which was unfortunate—but it was no surprise to the agents that he was carrying a loaded weapon with two additional magazines. But the thing is, CNN knew all this stuff, too. And yet, they reported everything but these details. And CNN’s original narrative is still out there, gaining traction. All wars have their martyrs.

Other media outlets carried the “ICE is detaining children” headline as far as they could before eventually retracting it. And yet, it turns out the child in the widely circulated image had been abandoned by his illegal father, and his mother refused to claim him. Rather than simply sending the child back into the world alone—a world in which kids like him are almost always trafficked—he was kept in federal custody. He wasn’t locked in a cage. He was being protected, which is most certainly the government’s job when it comes to little ones left to a world of wolves. But again, the thing is, the news outlets knew this, and yet they elected to foster a completely different narrative, stoking embers and adding kindling to an already blue-hot climate. Add to this the irony of a progressive left that would butcher children in the womb while weeping over a child rescued from the wolves, but only because the rescuer wore an ICE uniform rather than an abortionist’s surgical gown.

And so, again, “civil war” is a term showing up in my feed more than I’d prefer. But what should any of us expect? So many are actively laboring to make the climate perfect for one.

Having said all this, civil war is not necessarily my chief concern. Yes, what’s happening culturally and politically is troubling. Still, I’m thinking ecclesially. I’m wondering if American Christianity would even survive such a thing, especially a conflict in which Christianity is a primary target for the opposition. The progressive left is already doing everything it can to snuff the faith (John 15:18-19). What would happen if that side were to win an armed conflict? I guess I’m just wondering out loud if anything in the modern faith is still fixed enough to be confessed in a way that would survive through such an event.

For the record, this weekly message goes out in various forms to about 7,000 folks worldwide. I don’t pretend to have a comprehensive map of global Christianity, and so, I don’t necessarily know the liturgical practices of most of the churches and people who may be reading this. But I do know my own church. And I know what kind of Christianity formed it.

Our Savior Evangelical Lutheran Church in Hartland, Michigan, and the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod with which we maintain fellowship, is creedal in nature. Creedal Christianity did not emerge from comfort. It was forged under pressure. It survived being surrounded by hostile empires, wars, internal heresies, and, most importantly, competing visions of who Jesus was allowed to be. Creedal Christianity is a faith maintained by precise statements—what we believe and what we don’t, why we do what we do, why we’re distinctly different from the world around us. Regardless of what the more fashionable Christian influencers may have told you, these things are not relics of an overly philosophical age. They are the Church’s collective memory, crystallized at the very points in history where the fires were hottest, where the culture was hell-bent on consuming and assimilating us, and where losing our identity would have meant losing Christ altogether.

While studying the Church’s creeds with the kids in confirmation over the years, I’ve often told them that confessional statements like the ecumenical creeds (the Apostles’, Nicene, and Athanasian Creeds) are very important guardrails that protect our inheritance. What I mean is that by these confessional statements, the Church was essentially saying to the world, “We heard what you’ve said about Jesus, and we’re banning that interpretation from our midst forever.” They didn’t do that because the Church is allergic to questions, but because some interpretations—some answers to very important questions about God—can kill the faith (Galatians 1:6-9). The creeds exist precisely because the Church learned, often through blood, that not every version of Jesus is compatible with the Gospel.

For example, Arius, a bishop in Alexandria, came along offering a Jesus who was inspirational but not eternal. He insisted that Jesus was not God from eternity, but rather the first and greatest of God’s created beings. To be exalted, yes. But by no means divine in the sense that He is of the same substance as the Father. In reply, the Council of Nicaea (A.D. 325) gave birth to the Nicene Creed, which said, essentially, “Um, no. He is the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of His Father before all worlds, God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made….”

This response was not a modern branding exercise. It certainly didn’t come from thin air. It came from God’s Word (John 1:1-3, Colossians 2:9, and countless others). It was an important clarification made to preserve the one true faith that saves. I mean, what’s the point of confessing faith in Jesus—even being willing to die for Him—if the Jesus you confess is false? Creeds are in place precisely for this reason—to preserve a right confession of faith (1 John 2:22-23).

Even better, creedal Christianity never just remained on paper. Creedal Christianity was always ritualized Christianity. What the Church confessed with her mouth, she inevitably enacted with her body. I should pause here for a moment and admit that resistance to rites and ceremonies has always struck me as weird. Enacting what we believe is natural. We already do this instinctively in ordinary life. When people love one another, they don’t merely say it. They demonstrate it. They show up, they make vows, they give gifts, they mark anniversaries. When a nation believes in its sovereignty, it doesn’t just write a constitution, and then that’s it. It raises flags, sings anthems, swears oaths, and builds monuments that enshrine it. Belief naturally seeks embodiment. It inevitably embraces postures and practices that make the invisible visible. In the same way, the rites and ceremonies that emerged were the Church’s way of training the faithful to live inside the truth they confessed, week after week, year after year. It was a very natural way for the body and mind to remain in stride with what the heart confessed to be true (James 2:17).

When this kind of synchronization happens, the Christian faith becomes incredibly resistant to drift. Without them, almost anything can influence direction.

I suppose the thrust of my concern is that this is precisely what much of contemporary church culture has abandoned. Mainstream American Christendom seems to thrive on elasticity—on keeping Jesus just vague enough not to offend anyone and flexible enough to serve every demographic.

The irony in this is that it’s meant to promote growth. And yet, the American Church has been in free fall for decades. This free-floating, syrupy, confessionless, “deeds not creeds” landscape has not resulted in growth. It has resulted in massive erosion. But that’s what happens when your Jesus is more life coach than the eternal Son of God who comes again in glory to judge both the living and the dead (Acts 17:31).

Interestingly, even as creedal Christianity isn’t so much about growth as it is continuity, the early Church did grow—and quite rapidly. Why? Could it be because it refused what American Christianity is all too eager to embrace? The early Church did not survive persecution by becoming more appealing to Roman tastes. It survived by becoming more precise—more dogmatic, more confessional, and in my humble opinion, more liturgical. By its faith, life, and practices, it told the surrounding empires in no uncertain terms, in effect, “We will not adjust Christ to fit your world. You will have to adjust your world to Christ.”

Creedal Christianity can speak this way because it’s anchored in otherworldly things. It is, therefore, by design, capable of surviving this world’s storms. It doesn’t roll over when the challenges come. It can and does remain fixed in place even as everything else tries to pull it apart.

I know I’ve already gone on long enough. I’m guessing the skimmers left five minutes ago. For those who stayed to the end, I suppose I’ll circle back to where I started.

I’ll just say, again, that civil war is not my chief concern. Empires rise and fall. Cultures always burn themselves out eventually. Still, the real danger is not whether America fractures entirely. I’m just wondering if the American Church still possesses a faith sturdy enough to remain standing through it.

I don’t have this concern for creedal Christianity. It’ll survive. History has already more than proven that when and where the pressure mounted, a Church built on crisp confession remained immovable. Our Savior in Hartland is an heir to this hope-filled reality, and so, we enjoy that future. This is true because Christ did not promise His Church an easy path, but He did promise that the gates of hell would not prevail against the fixed Gospel confession that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God (Matthew 16:16-18). That’s a creedal statement, and where such confessions remain, so does the Church and the Lord who preserves her.

Live and Let Live?

Posted on January 25, 2026 by AngelsPortion

Unsurprisingly, what I wrote about last Sunday played out similarly this past week when protestors stormed a church in Minneapolis, demanding that the Christians within embrace their obnoxious crusade against ICE. And when they didn’t, they were shouted down and shamed. Like rainbow armbands in sports—an ideological symbol being imposed in this or that form, all with the threat of punishment if refused—the demands placed on the Christians in that church followed the exact same pattern.

I hope New York’s new mayor, Zohran Mamdani, is watching this stuff. These two scenarios—the athletes refusing to comply and the Christians in Minneapolis doing the same—while different on the surface, reveal the same underlying dynamic. The shunning common to both betrays collectivism’s innermost spirit. Mamdani did say he intended to replace the frigidity of rugged individualism with the warmth of collectivism. Well, we’re watching historic Marxist collectivism being paraded in real time.

Essentially, forcing anyone under threat of punishment to submit to ideologies and their symbols is a distinctly Marxist, and therefore a readily socialist, impulse. Mamdani is an avowed socialist. He believes that the “warmth of collectivism” is the subordination of the individual conscience to the demands of the collective, and it must be enforced not by persuasion but by institutional pressure. Marxist warmth, in practice, always comes with enforcement, because collectivism only works when dissent is treated as a problem to be punished.

Taking this a step further, what I’m really thinking about right now is the symbols themselves. What’s the harm in wearing a rainbow patch on your jersey? What’s the trouble with a church’s pastor raising a fist alongside protestors to stem trouble? What’s the trouble with driving a company car with a BLM or an ICE-out sticker on its bumper?

Well, for starters, the first thing I’ll say is that every movement in history revealed its true ambitions not first through laws, but through symbols. In that sense, symbols are rarely neutral. You know as well as I do that they train the eye and discipline the conscience. Symbols have a way of testing allegiance long before force is ever required. That’s why armbands, flags, and gestures matter, even before they are compulsory. They are never just a thing.

Since I’ve already sort of wandered near to what I was concerned about last Sunday, you’ll remember that rainbow armbands, jerseys, and other such things have been forced into soccer, basketball, volleyball, football, and so many other sports. When I say forced, I mean it. They’re always framed as harmless signs of “tolerance.” And yet, the countless stories of athlete after athlete being shunned or punished for refusing to wear one expose the deeper truth. Tolerance, by definition, allows dissent. But what we’ve witnessed is enforcement against dissent. Participation is no longer optional. If a person refuses, he or she becomes an example of moral failure and must be shamed accordingly. The only way forward for such a reprobate is total annihilation in the form of cancellation.

History teaches us to pay attention when ideological movements do this—especially when they migrate from persuasion to enforced uniformity. The comparison to past regimes is uncomfortable, but symbols worn on the arm (or, thinking back to COVID, maybe on one’s face) have long functioned as tools of social sorting. Everyone is identifiable. The ones wearing the symbols of compliance are safe. The ones without it are suspect. Again, the purpose is not merely expression but visibility.

But I think it gets even worse still.

I’ve long thought that the LGBTQ, Inc. movement’s use of a flag was bad news. The same goes for the BLM flag. This is true because flags never really originated as tools of personal expression. They were militaristic. They began as tribal identifiers—markers of people, allegiance, and territorial claim. They were carried by nations and armies not just to establish sovereignty, but often to impose that sovereignty’s will on others. Historically, when a flag was raised where another flag once flew, it signaled conquest—one culture replacing another, one authority displacing a rival. When I saw that Minnesota had changed its state flag, making it eerily similar to Somalia’s flag a few years ago, I wondered about displacement. When I started to hear about the billions in fraud orchestrated by the Somali community, to which the Minnesota government largely turned a blind eye, the flag’s redesign made a little more sense. It was a quiet announcement of who’s now in charge in the state.

Of course, in the modern age, flags have been repurposed for everything from corporations to clubs, but that does not erase their original meaning. A flag still signals a collective identity that believes its vision and mission, good or bad, must be announced and then carried into the world, and maybe in ways that will assure it finds a footing as the governing one. Even General Motors would love to see its flag being flown at a Ford building.

But what if it suddenly became a cultural expectation that Ford must fly GM’s flag? That would be extremely telling.

When a group’s flag moves from voluntary display to institutional expectation—on school walls, corporate labels, in movie and TV scripts, on government buildings and athletic uniforms, or wherever and whatever—it stops functioning as a gesture of tolerance and becomes an advancing army’s sovereign demand for submission instead. I spoke in terms of war in last week’s note. Indeed, when what I described starts happening, you know a very real conflict is underway. It’s no longer a debate, but instead, warfare is underway, and territories are being taken. The occupying nation now marks its seized lands. In these territories, dissent can only be treated as resistance.

I think this is a crucial distinction often obscured in public debate. And so, again, I think one of the best forms of resistance is to refuse to display the LGBTQ Inc. flag, which more and more people are choosing to do, especially among the youth—most assuredly among young men. In one sense, I think that’s happening because common sense is making somewhat of a comeback. On the other hand, “Not the Bee,” the Babylon Bee’s source for non-satirical news, reported a study suggesting Americans are pretty much sick of the LGBTQ, Inc. agenda. America has grown tired of the stuff being shoved down our throats day in and day out. The study noted that most Americans seem to have realized it was never about “live and let live.” It was always about something more. One line in the article stood out. It said, “[Young people] have been told they are ‘bigots’ if they believe [unnatural sexual relations are not okay] … but even if they tried not to be ‘bigots,’ they were told they were bigots anyway…” Maybe another way to think of this is to say, as I already did, that common sense is making a comeback. Common sense knows that a person can affirm human dignity while also rejecting ideological compulsion. The former is humane. The latter is totalitarian and dehumanizing.

From another perspective, I should return to that “live and let live” thought. It sure seems most ideologies seeking dominance began by insisting they merely wanted to be left alone, when that’s not at all what they really wanted. The eventual enforcement of their imposed symbols made it clear.

And so, I suppose the question before us is no longer about tolerance and treating people with respect. The question is whether any movement, however well-intentioned it claims to be, has the right to force individuals and institutions to accept its ideology publicly. The Minneapolis church and the shunned athletes sure seem to suggest that this question is no longer theoretical but is already being answered in practice. The moment you are required to display allegiance before you’re allowed to belong, you are no longer living in a free society. You are living under occupation.

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