Five Reasons to Travel to Latvia

I know that this is a major deviation of the trajectory of the blog. 
But I recently read a post by a Latvian friend of an article listing 5 reasons to travel to Riga.  And I realized that I did not connect with more than half of them.  It only took me a few moment of reflection to come up with my 5 reasons for loving Latvia and loving to be in Latvia.  So I decided to share them.  If I were a tech geek, I would have easily been able to find a better forum and mode of presentation.  But since I'm not, as my Constitutional Law professor was fond of saying (some of my best stuff comes from him) "as a concession to the shortness of life..." I have used the forum and medium I had available.  So here they are...
MY TOP FIVE REASONS FOR TRAVELING TO LATVIA:

5.  The Latvian Language: The people of Latvia were pressured not to speak their native language in public for 50 years!  The Caucasians of the USA have no conception what this would be like.  It is a beautiful language.  Early on when I began to hear it and reflect on it, I said, (I have had an original thought or two) that when someone is speaking Latvian they are speaking poetry.  But, of course, you don't have to go to Latvia to hear people speak in Latvian.  But... the greater joy is to speak it in Latvia.  What joy to see the surprise and experience the joy when a Latvian hears himself / herself addressed in Latvian by someone from the USA who is not Latvian!  (This is especially true if you are grammatically correct!  Latvian grammar is as complicated as Ancient Greek.)  I have stories of course, but that will get us too far off track.  I can share them in person.

4.  The Scenery: Latvia is about the size of West Virginia.  It is a land of beautiful lakes, and rivers, and forests, and the sea.  It's a lot like Wisconsin (and Minnesota).  It is not an accident that so many Latvians settled in Wisconsin and Minnesota. It's like home.  During the time of occupation (50 years) the leaders of Soviet Russia chose Latvia as the place for rest, relaxation and recreation.  Because it's a gorgeous country.  When I have Latvian guests, I will often take them around the lakes and rivers and forests of Wisconsin.  Just like home.

3.  The Castles: I think it is because I am a disciple of C. S. Lewis, and lover of "The Chronicles of Narnia" in addition to being so intrigued by the whole concept of Knighthood.  But I love visiting the Medieval / Feudal castle ruins throughout Latvia.  In my 24 trips I have had the blessing of visiting every region of Latvia.  And one constant is - the castles.  Latvia was a feudal system in Medieval times.  The Latvian word for city is "pilseta" which pretty much translates, "the place of the castle."  I have not seen them all, but I have seen very many over the years.  It never gets old.
Then, there's Rundale Castle.  This is a Renaissance Castle in southern Latvia designed to match the castle in France.  It is amazing; a must see.  It was used as a hospital (if I remember correctly) during Soviet occupation and had to be restored.  But it has been - beautifully.

2.  The Churches of Riga: There are many famous skylines.  Even Chicago.  But as the article posted by my Latvian friend pointed out, Riga is over 800 years old.  The St. James Cathedral was dedicated in 1225!  It continues to house weekly Mass.  Atop the St. Peter's Cathedral is an observation deck that allows a bird's eye view of the city of Riga.  The pipe organ in Dome Cathedral is one of the (if not the) greatest organs in all of Europe.  (I have had the blessing of hearing multiple organ concerts in the cathedral.)  The skyline of Riga Churches has been preserved in woodwork, photograph, painting, etc.
After landing in Riga and being picked up at the airport (I have not had to take a taxi yet from the airport.  More on that below.) I have been welcomed home (my second home) by the Latvian Cathedrals rising above the river.

1.  And the number one reason to travel to Latvia is...  THE PEOPLE.  Latvians have a reputation of being very reserved.  And in general this may be so.  But my great blessing has been to work "side by side" with my sisters and brothers in Christ, mostly in the Lutheran church, but not exclusively.  I have not experienced this reserved-ness among my sisters and brothers in Christ.  What I have experienced is warmth, welcome, sacrificial hospitality, and even fierce loyalty.  Of course I am not worthy of any of this.  But that's the point, isn't it.  It's not about me.  It cannot be about me.  Should it ever become about me, I am confident, I trust, that God will stop the opportunities to serve.  To some extent it is about them.  It's how they are.  But primarily it is about The One we love, follow, serve, obey.  "We ARE One in the Spirit.  We ARE One in The Lord."
I have been continually blessed by the joy of being with my young friends of Latvia.  (My older friends too, of course.  It's just that these days there are fewer and fewer people older than me.)  They keep me young, even when I sometimes feel really old. 
They think I'm important.  It makes me chuckle sometimes.  I get that I am not important.  But, I'm important to them because I love Latvia and I love the people of Latvian.  I work on perspective all the time.  The motto I adopted many years ago now helps keep that perspective.  "I have come to serve."

Of course the reason I began to serve in Latvia and the reason I continue to serve in Latvia 22 years and 23 trips later is that GOD called me to Latvia to serve and God arranged for my way to come and serve.  But I wanted my 5 reasons to be about Latvia and Latvians, not about God's call for me to serve.  I continue to serve as God calls and enables and empowers.  But these reasons make it my great joy and blessing to serve.

P.S.  I felt compelled to add as an "oh by the way" that in a recent European poll, Latvia was named the number one country in Europe with the most beautiful women.  Just FYI.  (Notice please its not on the list.)

(I have resisted the temptation to include Latvian phrases in this post because my office computer does not have Latvian letters installed, and I do know how to spell correctly in Latvian.  I may amend later to add them.  But maybe not.  This list is for those of my friends and colleagues who are not Latvian.)

I believe in The Creator who created... me.

"I believe in God, the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth."
Apostles' Creed, Article I

"We should emphasize the words, 'maker of heaven and earth.'  What is meant by these words, 'I believe in God the Father almighty, maker...etc.'?  Answer: I hold and believe that I am a creature of God..."
Martin Luther, Large Catechism, Creed, Article I

Can we please stop apologizing for believing Genesis 1 and the first articles of The Creeds?
It struck me today that I have not posted on creation, and that it does not go without saying in our current culture.  It should go without saying that I believe that "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth." Genesis 1:1.  But it needs to be established among us, without apology.  So this is my apology, without apology.  (It's a play on words...apology also means to defend... never mind.)

So having established that I believe God created the heavens and the earth, I want to add that I am not a "Young Earth Creationist."  (A young earth creationist believes that the universe was created less than 6000 years ago, because if you take everything in the Bible literally - which we should not - then counting backwards comes to less than 6000 years to Adam.)  The reason I am not a Young Earth Creationist is star light, and the speed of light.  (Even if our calculation of the speed of light is somehow off, we will never get to 6 thousand years from 6 billion.)  I have heard the arguments.  But as followers of Jesus and created creatures of God, we really don't get to take something that makes no sense and try to make sense of it by saying "God did it."

But notice that atheistic evolutionists do exactly the same thing.  They take something (more than one actually) that makes no sense and try to make sense of it by saying, "Time did it."

Atheistic Evolution makes no sense.  It's just impossible.  Darwin recognized that a system that could not be brought about by progressive approximations could not be explained by his theory (which required successive approximations)...a system like... the eye for instance.  Vision requires an eye, an optic nerve and a brain capable of interpreting the light signals.  Assuming a positive mutation resulted in an eye somehow (There has never been an observed positive mutation apart from human - design - intervention.) that eye would not give any competitive advantage.  It would not work.  Same with an optic nerve without an eye, or brain capacity.  The only way the eye works is fully formed as an entire system - designed, created, installed.

Atheistic evolutionists have been forced to concede for some years now that the DNA molecule could not have formed by random chance.  Now a scientist would conclude that the hypothesis of random combinations of chance had failed and abandon it.  But not our plucky evolutionists.  When faced with the Cambrian Explosion, our storytellers came up with "giant leap evolution."  When faced with the building block of life being unable to be formed by random chance, they came up with...wait for it...this is my favorite... alien DNA seeding!  Science?  Or blind faith?  And faith in what?

If you do not believe me, I recommend you rent (or buy) and watch Ben Stine's documentary, "Expelled."  One short clip is a part of our confirmation class each year.  It is the clip of Stine interviewing Dr. Dawkins.  In the clip Dawkins actually promotes the feasibility of alien DNA seeding!  I show my students because if I told them he said that, they would not believe me.  So I show them.  I also suggest you rent the movies "Mission to Mars" starring Gary Sinise and the newer "Prometheus."  They are both good movies, but warning here that Prometheus is R for a reason. (It is the prequel to "Alien".) If you want, just watch the opening scene promoting the "theory" of alien DNA seeding and making this ridiculous fairy tale viable for the public.  Mission to Mars does the same thing, but in the last scene rather than the opening scene.

Now for my brothers and sisters in Christ who are "Theistic Evolutionists", I admit that Theistic Evolution is not impossible, and does not deny directly the truth of the Scriptures, Creed and Confessions.  Conceded.  But I hope that you will also allow that I can believe both The Faith and Science by not buying into the argument that evolution works (worked) because "God did it."  (Sound familiar?)  Possibly.  But since this process has never been observed moving one species to another in the history of history, and in fact no positive mutation giving a competitive advantage has been observed, and, since science is based in observation and recording, I will remain a skeptic regarding evolution. So what are / were dinosaurs?  Um...extinct species created by God?  Humans have shown a remarkable ability to move species created by God to extinction.  Natural occurrences can do the same.

I believe in God the Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth.

I believe in everlasting life.

"I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy Christian Church (catholic in the Latin), the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting."
The Apostles' Creed, Book of Concord

"I acknowledge one Baptism for the remission of sins, and I look for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come.  Amen."
The Nicene Creed, Book of Concord

As I mentioned in my last post setting the stage for this post, the Gospel Lessons of Jesus raising the dead to life, and my re-reading of Ursula LeGuin's "Wizard of Earthsea" series (5 books) got me thinking about everlasting life.  I am grateful to my colleague, Rev. Dr. Clint Schnekloth, who is a voracious reader, for suggesting the book, "Immortality" by Stephen Cave.  I want to confess up front that I focused in reading the book on the opening, the closing, and the discussion of Christianity and The Resurrection to eternal life.

In the third book of Ursula LeGuin's series, the hero, the mage and later archmage, Sparrowhawk, descends to "the place of the dead" where he finds the "people" to be ghostlike, and without recognition or memory of their lives.  In book 5, a young magician and Sparrowhawk's adopted daughter "set the dead free" from this non-life by opening the gate to oblivion, through which the dead gladly go to escape the hell of eternal non-life.  But Sparrowhawk's adopted daughter is both human and dragon.  And dragons have a much different destiny.  Dragons have the possibility to fly beyond this world, and fly on "the other wind."  I pondered this quite a bit.  I came to a realization that as a self-proclaimed atheist, oblivion was the best that Ursula LeGuin could offer.  And oblivion was / is far better than an eternal existence as non-life.

In his book, "Immortality", author Stephen Cave arrives at a similar place.  He sets forth four immortality narratives, and then sets out to demonstrate that none of them is credible.  I only read his discussion of resurrection.  It was clear in the reading that Cave came from the perspective of atheistic evolution.  From that perspective, that starting place, it is of course quite true that resurrection is irrational.  But we come from a very different starting place.  We come from The Resurrection Event, the resurrection of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.  Not surprisingly, he does not deal with any of the voluminous evidence of the actual, historical, resurrection of Jesus.  [I do not list it all here.  My DVD (or manuscript) of my closing argument in the role of attorney laying out the substantial evidence for the resurrection is available upon request.]  For a God who created and can create ex nihilo (out of nothing) this is not incredible at all.  In his conclusion, Cave tries to create a narrative of hope and meaning from a system without eternal life - and ending in oblivion.  (He uses a Wisdom Narrative, taken partly from Ecclesiastes, while conveniently leaving out, "Vanity, vanity; all is vanity.")  I submit that his conclusions are as much imaginary wishful thinking as the narratives he attacks.  (This has been aptly demonstrated by philosophers for many, many years.) 

And this relates back to the conclusion of LeGuin's series.  Of course oblivion is far superior to a half-life, a non-life, of eternal existence without meaningful experience.  But, of course, these are not the only options presented to us.  In the Gospel of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, evidenced by His resurrection, attested by God the Holy Spirit, eternal life is offered to us to receive by grace through faith in Jesus Christ and His finished work.  We are offered the promise of going beyond this present world as we not know it and flying "on the other wind."

I believe in the resurrection to eternal life.

Coming Soon: "Eternal Life."

I like that my blog is still here and I can come back to it.  In Luke 7, Jesus raises a boy, only son of a widow, from the dead, just as Elijah (and Elisha) had done.  These texts got me thinking about eternal life.

I am planning on doing a blog post on "eternal life." I have been reflecting on this recently as I read through the 5 book series of Ursula LeGuin "The Wizard of Earthsea" and reflecting on the Gospel Lessons for June 9th on which I will be preaching in my beloved Latvia. But I don't want to write the post until I have read the new book recommended by my colleague, "Immortality." 

I will read this book while I am in my beloved Latvia in June.  When I return toward the end of June I will write my post on eternal life.

Coming Soon. 

Blessed St. Valentine's Day, remembering one who put love for God and obedience to God's call at a higher price than his own life. "Your Love is better than Life."

Below on March 22nd, 2012, you will find a post on the lives of Valentine and Patrick, as we move from St. Valentine's Day to St. Patrick's Day.

Thank you for walking with me.

I began this blog at the beginning of this year.  When I began it I knew, unlike other personal blogs, that it would be limited in time.  I knew this because it was for a very limited purpose: to look together at what the Lutheran Confessions "say" about issues that still arise in The Church today.  So I was going to eventually run out of material (sooner rather than later) because I was focusing not on fine distinctions in The Confessions themselves, but on their relevancy to specific issues that are actually on the table (whether they ought to be or not) in our culture and in The Church.  I think I have done that, and I am grateful to all those who took the time to read my selections from The Lutheran Confessions along with my commentary on them and application to today.

I am leaving the blog up even though it is not active.  I hope it will remain a resource for those who care what is written in The Lutheran Confessions that make up a significant portion of our self-definition as Lutherans.  (There is a "denominational quiz" running around Facebook that "places" us in denominations.  Not surprisingly, I did not find the "lutheran" characterization of doctrines very Lutheran at all.) 

From time to time a particular issue may catch my attention that I feel warrants a post, and I will do so and let you know on Facebook that I have done so to give you the opportunity to reflect with me on the position of the text of the Lutheran Confessions.

Thank you again and God bless you in your reflections and your following and your serving.

I did not want to close my blog without a quote from The Lutheran Confessions.  So I close with this from the final words of The Lutheran Confessions, the conclusion of The Formula of Concord.

"Therefore, in the presence of God and of all Christendom, among both our contemporaries and our posterity, we wish to have testified that the present explanation of all the foregoing controverted articles here explained, and none other, is our teaching, belief, and confession, in which by God's grace we shall appear with intrepid hearts before the judgment seat of Jesus Christ and for which we shall give an account."

Amazing Grace

The question has been, Is the preaching of the Holy Gospel strictly speaking only a preaching of grace which proclaims the forgiveness of sins, or is it also a preaching of repentance and reproof that condemns unbelief, since unbelief is condemned not in the law but wholly through the Gospel?

6. But when the law and Gospel are opposed to each other, as when Moses is spoken of as a teacher of the law in contrast to Christ as a preacher of the Gospel, then we believe, teach, and confess that the Gospel is not a proclamation of contrition and reproof but is, strictly speaking, precisely a comforting and joyful message which does not reprove or terrify but comforts consciences that are frightened by the law, directs them solely to the merit of Christ, and raises them up again by the delightful proclamation of God’s grace and favor acquired through the merits of Christ.

8. Nevertheless, as long as all this—namely, the passion and death of Christ—proclaims God’s wrath and terrifies people, it is not, strictly speaking, the preaching of the Gospel but the preaching of Moses and the law, and therefore it is an “alien work” of Christ by which he comes to his proper office—namely, to preach grace, to comfort, to make alive. And this is the preaching of the Gospel, strictly speaking.

1. Hence we reject and deem it as false and detrimental when men teach that the Gospel, strictly speaking, is a proclamation of conviction and reproof and not exclusively a proclamation of grace.

Formula of Concord, Epitome, Article V, Law and Gospel (emphasis added)

Two things up front.  I like it better when I don't work on posts on my day off. But I end up doing it to myself.  So enough whining. 
Secondly, this will be a longer post because the vast majority of the words I offer for your consideration are not mine. 

GRACE has become almost a magical word in the ELCA.  It is both a sword and shield, because anyone who does not agree with you "just doesn't understand grace."  This tends to include pastors who preach that God might actually have in mind that we DO something, as well as the concept that God might think that certain things are NOT OK.  "He just doesn't understand grace.  If he understood grace better.... (fill in the blank)."

The words that I feel a compulsion to share with you today on the topic of grace are not mine.  They are the words of Dietrich Bonhoeffer in his work which in English we call "The Cost of Discipleship."  The issue this brilliant theologian was addressing was the increasing tendency in The Church to "cheap grace."  He proposed that true discipleship is based in "costly grace."  And he set forth the difference between them in some detail.  I want to add quickly that the man who wrote these words also wrote powerfully, "The Christian Faith is forgiveness of sins.  Nothing more and nothing less."  (Life Together)  But forgiveness leads to "the joy of salvation" when there is a real sense of what we have been forgiven.  That is why I included the portions above on the preaching of Law and Gospel.  It is those who have a deep sense of sin who rejoice in the forgiveness received by God's grace and love through Jesus Christ.  It we don't get sin...we won't appreciate grace.  OK, enough, sorry.  As promised, "The Cost of Discipleship."

“Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves.  Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, communion without confession, absolution without personal confession.  Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.

      “Costly grace is the gospel which must be SOUGHT, again and again, the gift which must be ASKED for, the door at which a man must KNOCK.

      “Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ.  It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life.  It is costly because it condemns sin, and grace because it justifies the sinner.  Above all - it is costly because it cost God the life of his Son - ye were bought at a price - and what has cost God much cannot be cheap for us.  Above all it is grace because God did not reckon his Son too dear a price to pay for our life, but delivered him up for us.  Costly grace is the Incarnation of God.  Costly grace is the sanctuary of God.”

      “The price we are having to pay today in the shape of the collapse of the organized church is only the inevitable consequence of our policy of making grace available to all at too low a cost.  We gave away the word and sacraments wholesale; we baptized, confirmed and absolved a whole nation unasked and without condition...

But the call to follow Jesus in the narrow way was hardly ever heard....

“Cheap grace has turned out to be utterly merciless to our Evangelical Church.”

Grace is not free because it is cheap.  It is free because it is priceless.  (That's mine.)  The summary line of Bonhoeffer's book (remember he was writing in the 30s before "gender neutral language) "When Christ calls a man, He bids him, 'Come and die.'"  I find Bonhoeffer's conclusion in this section on cheap grace eerily familiar in our current Church climate and culture.  Maybe they should be taken seriously again?  Just a thought.  Grace is not a magic talisman.  It is a call to life (zoe).  But it is a call to a life of discipled (discipline) following one who is worthy of being followed.