Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Hey, YouTube theologians. Welcome to the Theology Q and A podcast. I'm Pastor Brian Wolfmuller, St. Paul and Jesus Deaf Lutheran churches in Austin, Texas, joined by Pastor Andrew Packer, pastor of Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Collinsville, Illinois. Pastor Packer, I heard a rumor about you that your favorite part of the whole podcast is the rumor part.
[00:00:15] Speaker B: Absolutely true, 100% true.
[00:00:19] Speaker A: Confirmed. No longer a rumor. You got some questions for us?
[00:00:22] Speaker B: I do. The first one is how do you spot and stop narcissist leaders before they harm your church?
So here's the background on it. I'm the adult daughter of a narcissist father. Growing up, my father used the scriptures as a tool to prop himself up. There was no gospel, only law. I was raised Church of Christ was already law heavy. We church hopped because he would look great and biblically knowledgeable, be put into leadership roles only to tear the church and our family apart.
I've been working through this with the amazing help of my Lutheran pastor and congregation.
My question is, how do we guard against these types of leaders in the church? How do we recognize these people before they become pastors? How should we react to narcissist people within the church?
[00:01:07] Speaker A: You are a pro at this thing. You want to start on this one?
[00:01:12] Speaker B: I'm a pro at this. I'm not sure how to take that.
Actually, in some ways I am a pro because I too have a narcissist father and he's imprisoned over it. So I do have some familiarity with, with this topic.
I think several things. One, I think churches need to be better trained on maybe even seminary professors. Others like on the signs of narcissism because there are like actual signs. You could just do a quick Google search or AI search or whatever and get the list, that technical list of what marks actual narcissism. The problem is today we throw around that term a lot, right?
We use the word narcissist a lot for someone who's just kind of arrogant or bragging or whatever while ignoring the more technical definition and the way they manipulate and use people and abuse people and things like that. So I think I would start there is getting the leaders of the church. That would include elders, church council and the seminaries. That would include seminary staff. Also admissions.
Just with the knowledge of what it actually looks like and is so they can better spot and determine those things. It's kind of like because of some things that happened in the district north of us, right? We've been put, we've been tasked with watching some things and they're trying to encourage in our district for us to be on the lookout for what it looks like for people who groom pastors and groom your staff to get access to like kids or stuff like that. Right. So this is very similar, I think, because narcissists are very good at that. They're very good at kind of grooming people to get in positions of power and leadership because it feeds their ego and then once they're there, they're just destructive. So I think the first step is having a real awareness of what this looks like.
That's like the bare minimum. Like be aware of what it looks like and then don't be afraid to call it out when you see it and stop those people from getting into these positions where they can do this kind of damage. Now if it's in your house, that's a lot harder, right? Especially if you're still under parental authority or whatever. That's a much longer and difficult discussion. But as far as the church itself, I think being aware, knowing the signs and then doing something about it when you recognize the signs, that would be where I would start.
[00:03:33] Speaker A: What can you, what's your kind of working thumbnail definition of narcissism? And how would you, how would you distinguish it from like what you mentioned before? Just extreme self centeredness, I think. And I'm, and I'm also interested in like the biblical language that we use for this where someone uses their authority that they have.
So maybe here's the biblical framework that we want to think about this just in broader terms. And that is that just because someone doesn't. Just because someone has the authority to do something doesn't mean that everything they do with that authority is going to be right.
In other words, just to think of it, in the home, the parents have the authority to govern in the home over the children. That doesn't mean that everything that the parents do with that authority is going to be good or right or healthy.
Just because you have authority doesn't mean you can't sin in exercising that authority. And in fact, sins of office do a lot more damage than sins outside of office.
So if a parent misuses the authority that's given to them over their children, then that sin is kind of doubly painful.
So I always would use this example, like if a stranger walked up and slapped me in the face, that's one thing. If my father walks up and slaps me in the face, it's a totally different thing. Actually it does so much more damage because he has the authority in the Office of Love and Care. The same thing is true for teaching. Just because pastors have the authority to teach doesn't mean they can't teach falsely. In fact, they have a higher responsibility to be careful about their teaching because the false teaching on the Internet doesn't do nearly as much damage as the false teaching that comes in the pulpit.
So a lot of times what happens is people will use the authority that they have to justify the actions that they do in the office when those actions themselves always have to be under scrutiny of the Lord's law.
[00:05:50] Speaker B: All right, I found this is actually an article I've used before from Psychology Today, which I know some people probably aren't gonna like that. It's from a. But whatever. It's. If you've dealt with this stuff, you'll recognize this definition. How do I spot a narcissist? Narcissism is characterized by a grandiose sense of self importance, a lack of empathy for others, which is really key here with what she said, a need for excessive admiration, and the belief that one is unique and deserving of special treatment.
And it often shows itself.
What's ironic is they'll often, they'll often accuse others of being manipulative, right?
They're so good at. Because everything revolves around them. They're really good at making you feel bad for like not doing stuff for them or living up to their standards. So they're really good at manipulating people and even accusing you of being manipulative towards them.
They're really good at that kind of stuff because everything focuses on them
[00:06:50] Speaker A: and
[00:06:50] Speaker B: everything must cater to them. And so if you're not meeting that, then you've let them down. And they can be really good at using the Bible, which was her experience, right?
Using the Bible to manipulate you, to make you feel like you haven't met certain standards, when actually it's just you haven't fed their narcissism. And that's actually what they're using the Bible for, is to rebuke you and to manipulate you to feed that desire for them to be treated as more important than anyone else in the world.
[00:07:25] Speaker A: So I would say the key takeaway perhaps is to on the lookout for someone who will use their authority in the Scriptures as justification for bad actions.
In other words, if a husband tells his wife, you have to obey me, I'm your husband. If a parent tells the child, you have to obey me, I'm the father. If a pastor tells a congregation, you have to obey me, I'm the pastor.
That when that Authority becomes justification for the actions that are committed in that authority. In other words, to remove the scrutiny from the actual actions. That's when you're in real dangerous territory.
[00:08:09] Speaker B: And they're very good at, from what I've seen, because I've experienced this not just, not just with my father, but with some others over the years. I think they're often very good at getting you to feel bad for them.
I've seen like this. That's part of the manipulation.
So that you'll want to encourage them to keep those positions of authority.
Right.
I remember an instance where someone was going to step down from a board position, a leadership position, and I was a young pastor. I didn't understand quite what was going on. I learned very quickly.
And everything, you look back on it, you're like, man, how was I so dumb to not see this? But the whole thing was a setup to manipulate me and some others to encourage this person to stay in leadership when really we should have said, oh, thanks be to God for your time of service.
Right. Like that should have been what we. Looking back, like that should have been the answer. Answer. But I didn't see what I. What I saw very quickly afterwards. And so they made us feel. They made us feel bad about them possibly stepping down and not doing this. And like, so we're the ones who begged them to stay in this position, which then turned into just a position to feed an ego and to really abuse the board and stuff. And it went bad from there. So, yeah, you have to be on, be careful with these things. It can go sideways really fast. And yeah, I would read up on it. Honestly, it's helpful to see some of the tactics, some of the things they do.
Like I said, Psychology Today actually has pretty good articles on the topic.
[00:09:52] Speaker A: Yeah. What are you. I was going to say recommended resources for the topic.
[00:09:57] Speaker B: Most of my reading have been some of these various articles through places like Psychology Today. There's also.
It's a little bit different, but related topic.
There's that book Antagonist in the Church, which deals some with that. And there's also the book which I don't believe is written by a Christian, but the Sociopath Next Door, which is not identical, but it is related. There are some related things there. So those are, those are helpful. Those were all recommended in seminary, I believe.
[00:10:23] Speaker A: Have you, have you read the book Boundaries by Townsend which is maybe not specifically for narcissistic, but all for. It's for kind of all these kind of personality disorders and maybe borderline especially and dealing with that.
[00:10:36] Speaker B: No, I've not read that.
[00:10:37] Speaker A: He's working. He's a Townsend Institute over at Irvine, and it's. I. I haven't read it either, but I've. I've just heard good responses from folks that have read it. So here's a. Here's a secondary recommendation. Not. Not from me, but I've. I've heard good things about that book as well, so.
[00:10:56] Speaker B: All right, next question.
Why do we need the Holy Spirit to desire God's grace?
I understand the Lutheran doctrine of the means of grace to be that the Holy Spirit works exclusively through the means of grace.
We also believe that we can't make the decision to believe without the Holy Spirit's work in us. My question is, how can one desire to receive the means of grace without the Holy Spirit calling Him first, implanting that desire in Him?
It seems to me that the Holy Spirit does call us before we even know there's such a thing as the means of grace. I'm thinking here of people who are not baptized as infants and are being called to faith as adults.
[00:11:32] Speaker A: So I think this question goes away when we recognize that the mean of grace, the tool or instrument of grace, is the word of God.
And it's that Word that makes baptism a means of grace, because it's the Word joined to the water and it's the Word that makes the supper the means of grace. When the word of promise is joined to the body and blood of Christ, that's there united to the bread and the wine. So the word there really is only one tool or instrument of the Spirit, and it is the Word.
And the Spirit is using that word to create and sustain faith in us.
So part of that faith is that longing for those things of God which we do not have. The things of God are distasteful for us apart from the work of the Holy Spirit. But then through the work of the Holy Spirit, then we actually long for those things. So I think if we just think of the mean or instrument of grace as the Word, then you realize that the Holy Spirit is always working through the Word.
[00:12:42] Speaker B: I broke my own rule a couple times on X the last couple weeks and gotten in discussions with people who are basically calling people who believe in baptismal regeneration heretics. And I thought, get grief, guys. Like, at least tone down the language. If you don't disagree with, that's fine, but this is kind of ridiculous.
But with both people, what's your rule on X?
[00:13:01] Speaker A: To not be on X?
[00:13:03] Speaker B: Well, to not engage people in those kind of discussions generally like, too much. Like, sometimes I'll throw out a comment and then just walk away. I don't really want to. I don't really want to get a long discussion with people on that there, because it doesn't, like, I don't know, people seem a little insane on there and they can't seem to have reasonable conversations. But I was just trying to get them to say that, okay, what actually then if you don't see baptism as a means of delivering salvation, then how. How does one become a Christian, right? And I was even just trying to get them to say the word, because then you can point out, hey, that word plus water, that's all it is, right? And with the one guy yesterday, he actually, he wouldn't say it, but like, he said, well, the Holy Spirit. And I said, well, how do they get the Holy Spirit? The Holy Spirit just zapped them. And he would not say that it's the word of God. And I was kind of blown away by that, that he wouldn't even acknowledge that it was the word of God. It's like, well, then how.
How am I going to evangelize? How am I going to talk to people? Do I just. Do I just do nothing and wait for the Holy Spirit to just zap people? It was just the weirdest conversation and it's happened like twice now. And I'm baffled that people.
Because you would think at the very least, if you believe in the Bible and you have a high view of scripture, whatever, that at least you'd be able to say, well, yeah, it's the word of God.
Well, then we can talk about how the word of God's present and baptism in the Lord's Supper and you can have at least have a conversation. But to not even say it's the word of God, I don't know what to do with that. Like, where do you go from there? Other than I just say, see you later, I'm done, I'm out.
[00:14:29] Speaker A: This is the problem with evangelicalism. Was it evangelical that it must have been the evangelical.
[00:14:34] Speaker B: The one was a Reformed Baptist, the one yesterday. I'm not sure exactly what he would call himself.
[00:14:38] Speaker A: Certainly not a Catholic or Orthodox. It was a Protestant.
[00:14:40] Speaker B: Correct? Yeah.
[00:14:41] Speaker A: Yeah. So. So the.
While the Protestant church, the Evangelical church will confess the inspiration and infallibility of the Scripture, it has to be only information.
Because if it's more than that, then overwhelms your free will.
I mean, that's their insistence on the free will involved. Even for those, for the Calvinists to have this revival Revivalized understanding of conversion. So it can't be more than information. So they will confess the truth of the scripture, but not the efficacy of the Scripture. Right.
Which is an amazing thing for us because we're like, it's God's word. It's got to do stuff. That's what God does with words. And no, it's.
Yeah, they'll fight on that. It's an amazing thing to see.
[00:15:28] Speaker B: I don't know what you do with Hebrews saying the word of God is living and active if you don't actually believe it's living. Inactive.
Because it's just hard to have a conversation at that point because then you're just saying, well, people just get saved by believing in Jesus. Okay, but how does that happen?
And they just throw out the Holy Spirit and you're like, okay, well, how does the Holy Spirit get to that person to do this? I'm glad you believe the Holy Spirit does something fantastic. But how? Through what means the Holy Spirit get to that person? And that's where the breakdown is. And then I usually just give up and go do something else.
[00:16:01] Speaker A: Confirming my grand theory, the Wolfmuller Grand Theory of Denominations. Is it narcissistic to name a theory after yourself?
So this is my Grand Theory of Denominations, and that is that the essence of Protestantism is it's anti sacramental. And that bleeds back into their theology of the Word by undermining the efficacy of the Word.
Just like the spirit of Catholicism and Romanism and Eastern Orthodoxy is anti word. And that bleeds back in by undercutting the benefit of the sacraments.
So confirming the theory, the humbly named Grand Theory.
[00:16:45] Speaker B: You called the Wolfmother Grand Theory.
[00:16:49] Speaker A: It's either grand or great.
The Wolfmuller grand and Great Theory of
[00:16:53] Speaker B: Denominations, the bestest theory ever.
[00:16:57] Speaker A: Grand and or great. A lot of people are telling me it's the best theory they've ever heard.
[00:17:03] Speaker B: We'll get you a mug that says world's Greatest Theory.
All right.
[00:17:07] Speaker A: Want to hear a story about this? This is hilarious.
You'll love this story. We were just up at catechism retreat, you know, we missed you, by the way.
So me and Flammy are sitting in Meus's camper, right?
And.
And I'm. I'm not there. So Flammy sits down and. And Jared's going to pour him a cup of coffee in the world's greatest dad cup, right? And Flammy says, no, no, that's not me. I need another one. So he gets another one. So then I walk in and he pours it in the cup and I say, oh, perfect.
Flammy rolls over.
[00:17:44] Speaker B: That sounds about right. That sounds.
[00:17:45] Speaker A: That sounds right. That's.
[00:17:50] Speaker B: That checks out. The veracity of that story checks out even though it wasn't there.
[00:17:54] Speaker A: Did we? I don't even remember what we're talking about.
[00:17:56] Speaker B: Well, now we're going to talk about church members greeting each other during the service. Why. Why don't Lutherans do this? So I'm a Lutheran. I belong to an LCMS church. I noticed that Roman Catholic and Anglican churches included. Time to formally greet fellow members.
They shake hands and say, peace be with you. I've attended several different Lutheran churches, but we don't seem to have anything similar from a church history perspective. I was just wondering if there is a specific reason why the Lutheran tradition does not include this. I realize that the focus is on receiving the Lord's gifts, but it seems that greeting fellow members is such an encouraging thing. I would only consider myself a baby Lutheran, so maybe I'm forgetting about something from the chagism. If you could point me to a resource, I would appreciate it. And I'd add, perhaps because this is related.
Paul says to greet each other with a holy kiss, which we also don't do.
And I think they're related, but go ahead. Why don't we stop the service to say peace be with you?
[00:18:51] Speaker A: It's a key part of our Lutheran identity is that we are not authorized to like each other.
So when I got to St. Paul, they had that greeting. I, I think it's after the.
Oh, I don't know. They had it in the middle of the service somewhere. Maybe at the beginning, after confession, Absolution, before the opening hymn. And the problem is once you start, you know, once, once you press play on that, it's a long time to gather. So it was like five, 10 minutes before you could sort of wrangle the cats back into order.
So we should, we should have a lot of time to talk to each other, to care for each other, to bless each other, to get to know one another in the church. It's really important.
I just think it's in the liturgy. It just sort of becomes disorderly. And I think that's why. And I don't, I don't know the history, though it would be interesting to, to, to dig in and try to figure out where that passing of the peace, where it came in and how it's been used, but I just, I just don't know the history of that.
[00:20:05] Speaker B: I'm not sure of the history either. I've been in one Lutheran church that did. The first Lutheran church I attended had it. And I believe they had it after the prayer of the church before the Lord's Supper. So I believe is where they had it.
And although it didn't take five to 10 minutes, there's just relatively brief, like you greet a few people around you and. And it was. And then the pastor was preparing everyone for the service of the Lord's Supper, so it didn't take that long.
But that's the only Lutheran church I've ever been in that's had that. I don't think I've ever attended another one either visiting somewhere or whatever that I've seen it done.
What would you say? Because I've heard this come up too in this relation. In relation to this, like I said, why don't we as Christians greet each other with a holy kiss?
Right. Pulses and Romans are then greet each other with a holy kiss.
How do we understand that?
[00:20:57] Speaker A: I don't know. It's when you, I mean it happens in some places, like, you know, if you're anywhere close to the Mediterranean Sea, you greet people with a holy kiss or even an unholy kiss, I suppose, depending on the person.
But it seems like, I don't know, the colder the climate, the less kissy people are.
[00:21:20] Speaker B: There's another grand theory.
[00:21:24] Speaker A: Write that one down.
You don't want to lose that wisdom.
[00:21:29] Speaker B: I did. I heard an essay on this.
Not, not by a Lutheran, but it was arguing that we should basically we should get over ourselves and greet each other. The holy kiss, that it was a way of humbling yourself as a way of showing love to, to your fellow Christians, etc. And that it would be a good practice for us to get back to the arguments I generally hear against it is that it was a cultural thing, right. Like you said, it's that area of the world that's very common. Well, even for non Christians. Right. To greet each other with a kiss on the cheek or whatever. Like that's very common. And so that it's primarily cultural and that if we shake hands, we're essentially doing the same thing, but just in the way our culture shows that. So that greeting someone, a brother in Christ, a sister in Christ, whatever it is, warmly with, you know, the peace be, the peace of Lord be with you or whatever it may be without the kiss is the same thing because it's cultural. So that's the argument I've heard against it primarily looking at the, the cultural Issue.
[00:22:38] Speaker A: I. I try. When I go to see people who are homebound, and especially on their deathbed, I always try to greet them with a kiss. You know, I put my cheek to their cheek and I'll, you know, kiss them or kiss them on the top of the head and to show that affection.
And I try to do that to all the people who. That I'm comfortable with, which is mostly my family, you know, so, like, the way that I greet my kids is I'll kiss them on the top of the head, which is hard for my son because he's taller than me, like.
But. And if we, you know, to normalize that kind of affection. I wonder, though, if the operative thing in St. Paul is not greet one another with a kiss, but with whole. In other words, you're greeting one another with a kiss. That's the greeting. But when you're doing it as a Christian, it's holy. In other words, there's something that's sanctified about the Christian affection that we have for one another.
[00:23:34] Speaker B: Yeah, I think it surprised me. We probably need to look into more. I think I do. I don't think I have all of that worked out, but I do think there needs to be more.
I think if you go to church and you run out as soon as it's over without greeting anyone, without trying to talk to anyone, I don't think that's a good thing.
I think if you're such a hurry that you can't even say hi to people or talk to anyone, and you're just in and out and you don't want to be bothered by people, you're missing out on much of what the church is. And really we're turning into, like, just something just for us. Like, we're not there for others. We're just there for ourselves, which I also think is not a very Christian attitude to have towards the divine service. Well, I'm just here for me, and if I got what I need, I'm out of here. You know, like, you're going to the supermarket and I gotta get in and out, get what I need, get out. And not only want to bother me, I think we need to get rid of that attitude at the very least.
[00:24:30] Speaker A: I just. I want to. I just want to say that that attitude at the supermarket is entirely appropriate.
[00:24:34] Speaker B: Oh, yes, absolutely. That's me at the supermarket.
[00:24:36] Speaker A: In fact, if you have any other attitude than the supermarket, I'm going to question you. But so I want to say. So here's your checklist. And this is in Order, intentionally in order. But this is important. So the first question is, do I have a church?
Someone says, what's your church? You say, that's my church. So you're watching this. You're on YouTube. You think, hey, YouTube gives me all the theology I need. False, you need a church.
Second, do I have a pastor?
So someone says, who's your pastor? He said, this is my pastor. Every Christian needs a pastor. And then the third. This is what you're talking about. Do I have friends at church?
That is essential. You are not authorized to be solo without Christian friends.
This is Hebrews 13. This is what Paul says when he's talking about the Resurrection. And he says, bad friends ruin good habits.
That we need Christian friends, people who notice if we're not at church. And it's just so much better to go to church when you have friends there, you know?
Although I remember this person said, he was talking to me, says, man, I don't like going to church. Nobody there likes me. Nobody's friendly. I try to talk to people, they turn away.
And I said, well, you got to go to church. You're the pastor.
[00:25:44] Speaker B: Exactly.
[00:25:47] Speaker A: So for you who are listening or watching to go through that checklist and say, do I have a church good? Do I have a pastor good? If not, I got a good one. Do I have friends at church? No. Well, then I'm going to invest in that. And it's good to remember, too, that just on the whole friendship thing, that we're called to have the vocation of friend.
And the more we can recognize the importance of that, of friendship, the better. This is a really vital thing. And I think in some ways, the Lutheran Church has missed the importance of the vocation of friend.
We need to re. Emphasize it. All of us are called to be good and faithful friends to one another. In fact, it's probably the cure to narcissism that my life is not for me, my life is for you. It's poured out for you. And that vocation of friend is vital, especially, well, for a lot of different reasons. And there's a lot to say there. But it's good to remember that, like, the people sitting next to you want you to say hi to them just as bad as you want them to say hi to you.
In other words, we feel this need to be seen and noticed, but we don't.
It's not a reciprocal thing. Peer pressure, oddly enough, is something that is exerted on us and we exert on others, but we only feel it incoming, not outgoing. And so you can have a room full of people and they all are wishing that someone would talk to them and say hi. But they all, you know, you get kind of wrapped up in that. So just talk to people. It's great. And even if they're like, man, he's a weirdo. I wish he wouldn't talk to me. Well, okay, they'll avoid you next time. Don't worry about it. They'll take care of that themselves.
So just. So just kind of pray that the Lord would help you open up and be affectionate to the people that are around you.
[00:27:43] Speaker B: I moved some things around because that ties in nicely with this next question, which is what advice do you give for people visiting a church for the first time and then also for the congregation, how they act towards the visitor. So I have a friend from college who recently moved back to his hometown of Round Rock, Texas. You might be familiar with this. He wasn't religious until he started attending church with me while we were roommates at the University of Arkansas. After he moved, he asked if I knew of any congregations in the area.
I suggested St. Paul in Austin, and he asked if I knew anyone there he could sit with. Because visiting a new church for the first time felt intimidating.
I didn't know anyone there, but he ended up attending a service with a friend and had a great experience.
That made me wonder, what advice would you give to someone who is looking for a new church but feels nervous about visiting? Because it seems like everyone already knows each other, it can be difficult to insert yourself into conversations and meet new people on the other side. What advice would you give to established congregations? What are some practical ways church members can make first time visitors feel genuinely welcomed and help ease the anxiety that often comes with walking into a new congregation for the first time. I want to answer that last one first. Just really quick before I forget this. Do not make them stand up in front of everybody and introduce themselves. I know a lot of small churches that do that. It's just a terrible idea. Please don't do that to people. Don't make them stand up so that you can all stare at them awkwardly. That's just.
We'll get that one off the board first. But going back to visitors, I'll sit
[00:29:15] Speaker A: on that last part first too. So as a congregation, all of us need to be praying this for our congregation as a whole and for the members of the congregation individually. That the Holy Spirit would give us the gift of hospitality and. And would increase that gift of hospitality so that the attitude that the congregation has when someone visits is you're with us now. And that hospitality shaped by the fact that almost everybody who visits a church for the first time has some traumatic something in the background.
Like, if you just think of what are the reasons why a person who's never been here before is now here.
The least traumatic rationale for that is that they're visiting Austin for the Formula one race and they normally go to Good shepherd in Collinsville and they watch our YouTube video. So they want to come to visit St. Paul. I mean, that's great.
That's not what I'm talking about. But what about the person who hasn't been going to church and then thinks that they need to go back?
Or what about the person who's been going to a Catholic church or a Presbyterian church or whatever church and thinks that they should try something else, listen to something else that's that's serious? Or what about the person who even is going to a different Lutheran church and now is going to try a different Missouri Senate church? Something's going on in the background.
In other words, that change that gets someone into church.
There's some intense spiritual and theological activity that has propelled someone into church. And so the congregation needs to have that sort of awareness when greeting and welcoming people. Now, you don't have to like, oh, what trauma brought you here today? I mean, that's not maybe the question, but to recognize that there's something going on and that there's a kindness and a gentleness and just a basic sort of human friendliness with which we can engage people who are, who are visiting and try to welcome them into church. Try to listen when they say their name, try to try to hear. And here's the question I always ask that I think is super helpful is I'll say, is this your first time visiting a Lutheran church?
And that'll tell me a lot of things. Number one, it'll let me know what kind of communion conversation I need to have. So it's not the. It's just in the background. So it's telling me that. But it's also going to help me to try to orient them for what to expect.
Like, oh, here, you know, what's your. Any church background here? You know, this is what some of the things to expect and stand and sit and don't worry in three Sundays you'll be helping the people next to you navigate the liturgy. But it's confusing for a couple of weeks, you know, whatever. And I can kind of help orient that and hopefully make a connection.
And I'M always looking for people to connect other people to.
So, hey, you know, make sure you meet this person, hand person off to this, this, this, and the congregation knows that that's what's happening so that we can try to do that, although sometimes you just can't get to everyone. And we're certainly not perfect at that. But as a congregation to be. We want to be.
Hospitality is.
It cannot be overemphasized. I don't think that's a huge and important part. A part of this.
[00:32:34] Speaker B: And I think most of our churches, I think most of our churches are small enough that that's pretty easy to do, to recognize someone and spot them. I have found, like, being in a larger congregation now, one thing people are intimidated by, like, members is they don't want to introduce themselves to someone who maybe has been a member 10 years. They just haven't met them. Right. Like, you just don't know the person, or maybe that person's a member who wandered away for a while now, has come back and you. You don't know who they are. So I've tried to encourage people like it. It's never wrong to say, I don't believe I've met you and introduce yourself, like, because even if they've been a member for 10 years, at least, at least you're doing it. You're not. You're not saying, hey, you must be new here, right? Like, and they're like, hey, I've been going every Sunday for 10 years, but this is my first time at this service. It's my first time at the 8:00am service versus the 10:30 service or whatever. So I think just even having that mentality, like, I'm at least going to talk to them and introduce myself and not worry about, well, maybe they're a member or whatever. If they end up being a member, great. Well, at least now you've made a connection with a.
A fellow member. Fantastic.
We're also trying to make it so that we have people kind of, like, who are constantly on the lookout for people who look unfamiliar with what we're doing or whatever, so that maybe they can go sit by them or help them, offer to help, say, hey, you know, do, are you lost? Or whatever, you know, in the, in the flow of the service, like, trying to find people that are willing to do that kind of stuff to be a friend if they don't have a friend to sit with. Because I, I don't think most, especially most Lutherans, but I think a lot of Christians in general don't understand how much of a big deal it is for someone to visit a church for the first time, how scary it is for them, how awkward it is for them, how they feel so out of place.
Because a lot of us, we've grown up in church, whether it's Lutheran or not, and we're used to just going to a church and being the new person. It doesn't really bother us a whole lot, even if we're shy. If you're shy or introverted, you might not love it, but you don't mind just going. Whereas for a lot of them, like, this is a really big deal, and anything we can do to make them feel welcomed and loved and cared for and just like you said, hospitable, being friendly can go a long way. But what can they do? Which is what you were going to get to here. What. What can the visitor do to make it a better experience for them?
[00:34:52] Speaker A: So the, the first thing is you're. There's so much research that you can do beforehand on the church website, which is pretty amazing. And a lot of times you can listen to sermons or watch a service or kind of get oriented. So that's really great.
I would encourage you, if you're going to visit a church, to send an email to the pastor, let them know that you're coming. And especially if you're coming and you're going to join them, if you're a Missouri Senate Lutheran, you're going to join for the Lord's Supper to let them know to announce for communion or if you can't do that, to show up early and to introduce yourself and to announce. I really appreciate that when that's happening. So you're not trying to make those kind of decisions on the fly. So that's really good. And just a smile and be friendly. And even after the service, just if you just stand there and look around at people and be like, I was talking to a guy yesterday, he's been visiting for a few weeks, and he says, I want to have a little sign that says, I'm visiting. Please talk to me. And I said, well, you can kind of do that by just doing what you do. I mean, he's great. Just stand there and smile and introduce yourself to the person and even say, I'm new here. To, to put yourself out there is really great.
To make sure to introduce yourself to the pastor and, and to offer to take him out for a cup of coffee is always great to, to have that conversation. I. I think these, you know, pastors ought to be Always willing for this conversation. Always excited about this conversation. So,
[00:36:18] Speaker B: all right, next one's on sanctification. How exactly does sanctification work and what is it for?
Am I correct in understanding that rewards promised by Jesus in the kingdom of heaven will differ in their degree of glory precisely depending on the level of our sanctification?
So what is it? What is it and how does it work?
[00:36:37] Speaker A: What's it for?
So this is a big question. I want to. So let's just thumbnail it and then you tell me what interesting little thing to dive into. The first is that when we talk about sanctification, there's two ways that we can use the word.
One is the broad sense of everything that God does to make us holy, which will include the preaching of the law, to show us our sin, the forgiveness of sins, the gift of baptism. The Holy Spirit sanctifies us through baptism.
All of the work of the Holy Spirit to make us patient in suffering, to encourage us to. To serve God and love our neighbor, and even death and resurrection is part of our sanctification when the Lord brings us to the new heaven and the new earth. And in that way, like the entire third article of the Creed, I believe in the Holy Spirit.
Everything that follows, all the five things that the Spirit does, that's our sanctification in the broad sense. In that way, even forgiveness of sins and justification is part of our sanctification.
But normally what we mean is sanctification in the narrow sense, and that means the growth in good works that follows justification. In other words, the Christian life, the part of our lives that's putting to death the works of the flesh, and that's endeavoring. And in fact, not just endeavoring, but beginning to serve God and love the neighbor. And the Holy Spirit is at work through the Word, through the means of grace, to strengthen not only our faith, but also to work through us so that we want the right things, so that we decide the right things, so that we think the right things, so that every now and again we do the right things.
And that second part, that's what we mean by sanctification. And it is the Holy Spirit's work. But in fact, in a wonderful way, the Holy Spirit cooperates with us.
Well, better we cooperate with the Holy Spirit, or maybe better we come alongside the Holy Spirit and are working together in these good works.
And, well, there's more to say about that. But what do you think is most what the questioner is getting at here?
[00:38:49] Speaker B: Yeah, I think that answers the first part, like, how exactly does it Work and what is it for? So I think you answered the first part. So the second part then is, are the rewards promised by Jesus in the kingdom of heaven? Will they differ in their degree of glory depending on the level of our sanctification?
[00:39:09] Speaker A: So do you know the key text on that?
On that differing degrees of glory. And remember what the old theologians like Peeper said.
There's one bliss, different glories.
And so it's not like the bliss of life everlasting will have different degrees. We'll all have the same phenomenal rejoicing in eternal life, but there's different degrees of glory, like the stars in the heaven. And Daniel 12 says, those who lead many to righteousness will shine like the stars in the heaven. In other words, it seems like the particular glory that shows up in the new heaven and the new earth is the glory not of our own righteousness, but the righteousness that we support in others.
Those who lead many to righteous will shine like the stars in the heaven. So it seems like there's a particular glory for those who, according to their vocation, were helping support the repentance and faith of people around him. Now, here is. So I do think it's sanctification in a way, but it's kind of just our scripture witness is a sort of a narrow band. It's like a narrow sense of part of that sanctification. But here's the amazing thing that I think about, and we maybe have talked about this before, but I've been.
I can't stop thinking about this idea. Is that part of the glory, part of the wonder of the new heaven and the new earth is that how brightly I shine is really of no interest to me.
My joy will be in how brightly you shine.
And I'll see these bright shining stars, like Luther says that Joseph will shine brighter than all the others.
And I'll look at Joseph and he talks about that because he. He led all of Egypt into the confession of Christ, which is an amazing thing to say anyway. But so like you and I, Packer, we'll be walking around in the new heaven and new earth, and we'll see Joseph just like a radiant beam.
And we will be like, wow. His brightness will be our joy.
You know, when we see. When I see how brightly all the people around me, I don't even. I'm not even concerned about my own radiance.
I'm so enraptured with the glory that God gives to other people, which is the exact opposite of our existence now. I mean, now we're like, oh man, I wish God gave me those gifts, not that guy. You know, I wish God gave me these things, not that guy. We're kind of governed by envy and all this, but that's just flipped on its head. And so the gifts that God gives to others will be our joy in the resurrection. And there's a foretaste of that, like when the scriptures tell us to weep with those who weep and rejoice with those who rejoice.
It's this practicing of that life, of the resurrection, where my joy comes not from the gifts given to me, but from the gifts given to you, which is, boy, it just seems such a nice way to exist, to be free from those, from that. The shackles of envy.
But so in other words, I think to answer the question, yeah, it's part of our sanctification, but as far as we can tell from the scriptures, it's the yet unique part of leading many to righteousness.
[00:42:46] Speaker B: All right, I think that's it for this week.
[00:42:50] Speaker A: Thanks everyone for your questions. Wolfmuller co Contact is where you can send more.
How many questions we have? Are we getting to the bottom of the list here?
[00:42:59] Speaker B: No, I can't keep up. I'll be honest. Like, I don't know what happened the last like two to three months, but they just keep coming in. I answer them, I send, well, we answer, you know, five a week right now. And then I try to answer a bunch personally via email and then they just keep coming in though. I can't.
[00:43:18] Speaker A: You know, we should do it. We should do like a live stream one day, like a, a 10 hour marathon where we try to answer 300 questions or something like that.
[00:43:28] Speaker B: Yeah, that sounds fun.
[00:43:30] Speaker A: That does sound fun. Let me see if Flammy wants to come on and do that with you. So that'll be good. So thanks for your questions. Keep sending them. Wolfmuller co Wednesday is the place to sign up for Wednesday whatnot. And that's a lot of fun as well. So thanks everyone for being part of the fun. God's peace be with you.
