Ashes of a consuming fire

Recently I received by e-mail my electronic copy of Logia, a journal of Lutheran theology. Logia dedicates each quarterly issue to a central theme and advertises its editorial schedule well in advance. So I had been waiting more than a year for the Epipany 2010 issue on Lutheranism in Latin America.

There was a lot of good stuff in the magazine, but what I would like to note is a comment by Dr. Douglas R. Groll, professor emeritus of Concordia Seminary, St. Louis. He described Culto Cristiano, the hymnal whose order of service we follow, as "a fine mid-century Lutheran hymnal considered by many non-Lutherans to be the best Spanish language hymnal of the last century." I share his opinion, but I mention this only to praise Culto Cristiano before criticizing it. But it is only a small criticism.

Culto Cristiano (from Concordia Publishing House) was originally published before the revival of interest among Lutherans in the imposition of ashes to mark the start of Lent. The imposition of ashes basically consists of the pastor using ashes to mark the foreheads of the penitent with a cross while repeating a paraphrase of Genesis, chapter 3, verse 19: "Remember, you are dust and to dust you will return." Dust and ashes are often used interchangeably in the Scriptures as images of mortality (as in Genesis 18:27 or Job 30:19). The ashes also signify repentance as the practice of wearing sackcloth and sprinkling oneself with ashes to express sorrow and/or repentance of sin also dates back to Biblical times.
Of course, the cross symbolizes the hope of forgiveness and redemption in Christ.

Ash Wednesday is named for the rite of imposition of ashes, which seems to have originated in the 12th Century. During the Reformation, Lutherans retained Ash Wednesday as the beginning the 46 days of Lent, but the imposition of ashes ritual fell into disuse, for reasons that are not entirely clear. It certainly is rather odd to celebrate "Ash Wednesday" without the ashes, so perhaps it is not surprising that there has been a revival of the ritual in Lutheran circles, including the Lutheran Church of Venezuela.

But there is no recommended form for this ceremony in Culto Cristiano, so there is no standard practice. For our first Ash Wednesday service in La Caramuca, I led our group in the order of public confession and absolution, followed by the imposition of ashes, then by the order of evening prayer. Fortunately, the lessons provided by the lectionary served very well, for instance, Psalm 51:1-13.

I delivered a brief meditation in which I compared the light of God's holiness to the tropical sun at midday. Standing in that intense light for any length of time without covering might mean death by heat stroke or dehydration, but the light of God's holiness is much more intense than the midday sun. Without the protective covering of Christ's righteousness, it would burn us to ashes. The ashes in the form of a cross remind us that because of Christ's suffering and death on the cross, we may walk in God's pure light, free from the powers of darkness.

With the preschool children, I tried a different approach. I showed them a jar of soil, a jar of ashes left after we burned some leaves and a whole leaf from one of our trees. As long This might take a long time, if the leaf was just covered by other leaves, or a very short time if the leaves were burned. So in some countries, dead bodies are buried in the ground and slowly return to dust, while in other countries the bodies are burned and quickly become ash. Either way it's ashes to ashes, dust to dust. But in Christ we have the promise that one day we all will be restored to life, body and soul. So instead of just dumping human bodies in a landfill, or burning them, we honor the deceased with a burial service that expresses the hope that the body planted in the earth will one day rise again to eternal life.

Pilgrimage to Paradise

During Holy Week 2009, we accompanied 12 preadolescents, from six to 13 years of age, to El Paraiso Lutheran Church in Barquisimeto for a three-day retreat. We left Wednesday morning, April 8, and returned Saturday afternoon, April 11.

Five of the children were from La Caramuca and the rest were from Corpus Christi Lutheran Church in Barinas. With the children from Barquisimeto, there was a total attendance of 37 preadolescents. In addition there were six adolescents and 19 adults, including representatives from La Caramuca and Barinas.

Barquisimeto lies north of the city of Barinas, a journey of about three hours. Thanks to donations from our supporters in the United States, we were able to rent a bus.

The capital of Lara state, Barquisimeto is the fourth-largest city in Venezuela with a population of more than 800,000 people. It is home to a professional baseball team, the Lara Cardinals, and professional basketball and soccer teams, both known as the Lara Guaros. (The term guaro refers to a species of bird similar to a parrot. It also is used as a slang term for a person born in Lara and some surrounding areas). The large public soccer stadium in Barquisimeto was built specifically for several matches in the Copa America, an international soccer tournament that Venezuela hosted for the first time in 2007.

Barquisimeto is known as the location of several universities, a flourishing musical and cultural life and for the manufacture of musical instruments.

The city also is home to two Lutheran Church of Venezuela congregations, Cristo es Amor (Christ is Love) and El Paraiso, plus two new Lutheran mission stations. None of these congregations are served by their own pastor. Rather a national missionary, a young man named Miguelangel Perez, has been assigned to serve them all. This year he has the help of two vicars, Isaac Machado and Angel Eliezer Mendoza. All four groups in Barquisimeto were represented at the retreat.

"El Paraiso" means "Paradise", but the name of the church has no Biblical significance. Rather, the church was named for El Paraiso de Cabudare, the "urbanizacion" or suburb, where it is located. Nevertheless, it is an apt name because the church grounds are landscaped and immaculately maintained, with stately trees and a collection of rare and beautiful flowering plants (rare and beautiful even for Venezuela). These all are well cared for by an older fellow who lives on the grounds.

There is a freestanding worship sanctuary, a large parish hall with kitchen, showers and guest bedrooms (where we all stayed), and a separate office building. This is quite an elaborate setup compared to what we are used to in Barinas.

There were devotions every morning, and throughout the day Bible studies and games for the children. Everything was aimed at explaining the events of Holy Week, starting with Jesus' entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, His suffering and death on the Cross, and ultimately the hope of the Resurrection on Easter Sunday.

Of course, on Thursday and Friday evenings there were Maundy Thursday and Good Friday worship services. In Venezuela Maundy Thursday is simply called "Jueves Santo" or "Holy Thursday". "Maundy" is a peculiarly English word of uncertain origin. One popular explanation is that it derives by way of Old French and Middle English from the the first word of the Latin translation of John 13:34, "Mandatum novum do vobis ut diligatis invicem sicut dilexi vos". This passage is part of Jesus' words to his disciples after washing their feet after the Thursday Passover meal, "A new commandment I give to you, that you love another as I have loved you".

However, other scholars say that the archaic English word "maund" originated with the Latin "mendicare" (to beg), and the name Maundy Thursday developed from a medieval custom whereby the English royalty handed out alms to the poor on this day. "Maund" also is the root of "maunder", a word sometimes still used in modern English. It means either a) to talk in a rambling, foolish, or meaningless way; or b)to move, go, or act in an aimless, confused manner (after the manner of a beggar or homeless person)".

At any rate, the Thursday service was a communion service and Isaac Machado preached a sermon, based on Mark 14:12-25, about the significance of the sacrament. It perhaps was a little long and involved for the younger listeners, but he made all the right points, especially in regard to closed communion.

Closed communion means the practice of restricting participation in the sacrament to those who have confessed and received absolution for their sins, and who have confessed a common belief about the nature of the sacrament. This is based on a reading of Scripture passages such as 1 Corinthians 11:27-29:

"Therefore whoever eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For he who eats and drinks in an unworthy manner eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord's body."

Thus it is an act of Christian love and responsibility to prevent those living in sin, including the sin of false belief, to participate in that would bring further judgment upon them.

St. Paul also writes in 1 Corinthians 11:26, "For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes". For Lutherans, this means that those who commune at the same altar are thereby declaring publicly that they are united in the doctrine of the Apostles (Acts 2:42, 1 Corinthians 10:17).

So in Lutheran churches participation in the sacrament normally is limited to confirmed members of a Lutheran congregation, or, in other words, those who have publicly confessed the belief that in the Lord's Supper we receive the true body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, under the bread and wine, that along with the bodily eating and drinking we receive forgiveness of sins, life and salvation.

But the practice of closed communion was not invented by Lutherans and limited to Lutherans. Justin Martyr wrote this about early church practice in the second century A.D.:

"And this food is called among us Eukaristia [the Eucharist], of which no one is allowed to partake but the man who believes that the things which we teach are true, and who has been washed with the washing that is for the remission of sins, and unto regeneration, and who is so living as Christ has enjoined."

Some form of closed communion remains the rule in the Roman Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox churches, and conservative Presbyterian, Baptist and even Mennonite churches around the world. Nevetheless, since the 18th Century, many Protestant denominations have absorbed the rationalistic idea that no belief, if sincerely held, can be considered a sin. More recently, the worldwide neo-Pentecostalist movement has mounted a renewed attack on the teaching that the Holy Spirit works through visible, exterior means.

Thus the widespread practice of "open communion", in which anyone, even those who have not received Christian baptism, may participate in the Lord's Supper. This is particularly true in Venezuela where "Protestantism" and "Pentecostalism" have come to mean almost the same thing. (Of course there are "charismatic" Catholics in Venezuela, too, but most people who become involved in this type of error wind up leaving the Catholic Church.)

Our Holy Thursday service concluded with the stripping of paraments from the altar in anticipation of the Good Friday "Tenebrae" service.

Seven candles were placed on the bare altar and Miguelangel, Angel Eliezer and I took turns reading the seven last words of Christ from the Cross. We extinguished one candle after the reading of each lesson.

Miguelangel let me be the "officiant" at the Good Friday service, which meant a couple of things. First, I got to wear the black vestments (coal-black alb and a black stole with silver-gray trim). It was quite a striking variation on the regular theme and I felt bad that the church only had one set of the vestments. Miguelangel and Angel Eliezer simply wore their black clerical-collar shirts with black trousers and shoes. It would have been quite a statement if we all three at least had worn black albs. I continually am impressed by how the ancient liturgical practices of the church teach the basic truths of the Bible in both visible and audible ways (much better than PowerPoint presentations).

The second thing was that I read the seventh lesson and, after the seventh candle had been solemnly carried out of the church, slammed the Bible shut as the church was plunged into total darkness. After some time, the seventh candle, representing the promise of Christ's victory, was returned to the altar where it remained burning for the rest of the night.

Angel Eliezer preached the Good Friday sermon on John 19:28-37. He had asked my advice on it, as he was struggling with how to explain why Christ had to die on the Cross for our sins. He was working with the idea of penal substitution, that Christ suffered and died for our sins so that the demands of God's justice might be met while making it possible for us to receive God's mercy. But he was not sure if he could make the congregation, especially the younger members, understand the legal concept of why things that happened so many centuries in the past would have a profound impact on their lives today.

I suggested using a medical metaphor, speaking of sin as a disease transmitted from generation to generation, and invariably fatal if left untreated. Christ offered Himself as a sacrifice so that His pure blood might cleanse our tainted blood. This might make sense to the children as during the week they had studied the Passover tradition and the importance of blood sacrifice in ancient Judaism. Angel Eliezer liked this suggestion and decided he would use the specific example of HIV/AIDS, since it is a big social problem in Venezuela and everyone would understand the analogy. HIV/AIDS is transmitted through the blood, often from generation to generation, poisons relationships between people, destroys trust, and is always fatal if not treated with expensive medicine. I had not thought of that, although we have talked to the children in La Caramuca about HIV/AIDS.

After the Good Friday service, the electric lights throughout the church's compound were shut off for about a half hour. As we sat in the darkness, some of the adults whispered the most difficult questions about divine truth and justice that they received from unbelieving friends and neighbors. Such as:

• If God is all-powerful,all-knowing and good, why does He allow evil to exist?
• If God made Adam and Eve so that they were capable of sinning, did not God make a flawed creation?
• With all the different religions and philosophies in the world, how can one be sure what is the truth?

The difficulties arise because, in fact, there are some things only God can know and only God can judge. Who deserves to live and who deserves to die? Actually, according to Scripture we all deserve to die and only by God's grace do we still draw breath. Yet the Bible also assures us that God formed us all in our mothers' womb (Isaiah 44:24) and because all human life is precious in God's sight, Christ died for all that all might have eternal life (John 3:16).

But what is the worse fate, to die at 18 in a terrible car accident with so much unrealized potential? Or to live to middle age and see so many youthful dreams turn out to be either false hopes or if realized, not really what you envisioned? Or to live to nearly 100 and, even you are fortunate enough to stay reasonably healthy and financially secure, see the world of your childhood fade completely into memory?

God only knows. But God promises that as long as we are still here on this earth He has a purpose for our lives (Jeremiah 29:11), that all things work for the good of them that trust Him (Romans 8:28) and that if we trust God, we will never be tested beyond our endurance (1 Corinthians 10:13).

How could an all-powerful, all-knowing God have made a world in which our choices have consequences for ourselves and others? Could He not have made a world in which we could put our hands on a hot stove and not be burned? Or throw ourselves off a cliff and not break our bones? Did not Satan once ask that of Jesus?

We have only the reply that Job received: Let God be God and trust that His will is holy and good. Aside from these Biblical assurances, what hope do we have? Even if we deny God, we still are left with a world full of pain and suffering and no expectation of ultimate justice or redemption.

But in Christ, all Biblical promises are made good, and in Christ we may see that in this world of suffering, God Himself suffered more than we will ever be called on to suffer. And, since the teaching of the Bible all point to Christ on the cross, in God's Word we may find certainty amid the babel of religions and philosophies, all of which boil to down to finding salvation or enlightenment in ourselves rather than saving work of Christ (Ephesians 4:14).

I thought of these things as I prepared my Easter Sunday sermon on John 20:1-18. This is the glorious Easter story as told by John, but it also illustrates that all the evidence in the world does not compel faith. For the synoptic Gospels record that Jesus told His disciples three times that He would die on the Cross and rise on the third day: once after the confession of Peter (Matthew 16:21; Mark 8:31; Lucas 9:22), again after the Transfiguration (Matthew 17:22; MarK 9:31; Luke 9:44-45); and a third time (Matthew 20:18-19; Mark 10:33; Luke 18:31-33).

Despite this, what was Mary Magdalene's reaction upon seeing the open tomb of Jesus? She ran back to the other disciples and said, "They have taken away the Lord out of the tomb, and we (she and the other women) do not know where they have laid Him". Then Peter and John went to the tomb and examined the discarded (yet neatly arranged) linens that had covered the dead man's body. But they still did not completely understand what had happened.

After Peter and John left, Mary Magdalene had a vision of two angels in the tomb, then encountered the risen Christ Himself. But she still asked Jesus, standing right in front of her, where they had taken her Lord's body. Only when the Lord spoke did she recognize Him. But if they had paid more attention to His words in the first place, they could have spared themselves much fear and doubt.

Our faith is based on evidence, not wishful thinking. Palestine is a real place on the map, not an imaginary country. Jerusalem is a real city that still exists today, as do the towns of Bethlehem and Nazareth. Pontius Pilate, Caesar Augustus, Tiberias, King Herod and his sons, and Quirenius the governor of Syria were real historical figures. There is much testimony outside of the New Testament to indicate that something extraordinary happened in Palestine 2,000 years ago. At the very least, the Roman and Jewish authorities had an extraordinarily hard time explaining an empty tomb.

Yet it is not the evidence interpreted by human reason that leads to savng faith, but rather the Holy Spirit working through Word and sacrament. May God bless you with the certainty of this faith.

Alonso Franco joins us as vicar

Alonso Franco was installed as vicar at Corpus Christi Lutheran Church on Sunday, January 18, 2009. He will serve in Barinas and La Caramuca for three months before being transferred to Fuente de Vida (Fountain of Life) Lutheran Church in Puerto Ordaz.

Alonso led the Service of the Word, Pastor Eduardo Flores preached the sermon, and I led the Service of Holy Communion, with Alonso assisting in the distribution of the sacrament. For the next three months, Alonso will preach at least two Sundays per month and lead Bible studies at Corpus Christi. I will be responsible for reviewing his sermons and Bible studies and lending him whatever counsel and aid he requires.

Alonso's father, Pastor Alcides Franco, served as president of the Lutheran Church of Venezuela for 14 years, and also as pastor of La Santa Trinidad (Holy Trinity) Lutheran Church in Caracas, and La Ascensión ( Ascension) Lutheran Church in San Felix de Guayana before becoming pastor of La Reforma (Reformation) Lutheran Church in the same city.

His older brother, Pastor Jonathan Franco, served for a number of years as leader of the national Lutheran youth organization, and is currently treasurer of the national church. Jonathan also has been chosen to go to Argentina for advanced theological study at Concordia Seminary in Buenos Aires. Of course, this means someone else will have to be selected as national church treasurer, but we cross every bridge when we come to it.

We loaned Alonso a microwave oven to use while he stays in the pastoral residence at Corpus Christi. Luz Maria saved up some money and bought the microwave last year, but about that time the wiring in our kitchen died and we have yet to replace that. So up to now we had not even taken the microwave out of the box. I should add that the preschool has its own, separate kitchen where the wiring still is more or less okay.

Luz Maria has been working very hard on completing her thesis for the fifth-level teaching degree. She will finish by the end of this month. However, since the semester does not end until July, she will have to wait until then to receive her degree.

Christian art workshop a success

Twenty-three people attended the Christian art workshop that Luz Maria organized in Caracas on January 9, 2009, including myself, Luz Maria, and Luz Maria's daughters, Yepci and Charli. The emphasis was on visual art (rather than, say, music) in the form of liturgical vestments and paraments, banners, crosses, crucifixes and the like. The attendees included clergy and laypeople from Barquisimeto, Barinas, Maracay, Caracas, Barcelona, Maturin and San Felix de Guayana.

Yoxandris Marcano of Cristo Rey (Christ the King) Lutheran Church in Maturin gave what was perhaps the best presentation. In fact, it was a well-organized PowerPoint presentation highlighting not only her own work, but that of several other members of Cristo Rey. She had stored presentation on a USB flash drive (which are everywhere in Venezuela now, one gigabyte costs about $20 to $25, two gigabytes about $40 to $50). To show it, we used my laptop computer and a projector borrowed from Elsy de Machado (there was no screen, we just used a blank wall).

This may only mean something to my readers who have been to Maturin on short-term mission trips, but Yoxandris is a niece of Dagnys Marcano, who is now married to Pastor Francisco Cabarcas, and Oveida Marcano, former manager of Tierra de Gracia Lutheran Farm. Oveida recently married, but I do not know her husband's name. Yoxandris' father restored the walls and put a new roof on what is not the pastoral residence at Tierra de Gracia. It is rather exciting to have lived in Venezuela onl five years, yet to see already a new generation of leadership emerging within the Lutheran Church of Venezuela.

Yoxandris made the red stoles that were presented to Eduardo Flores, Sergio Maita and myself upon our ordinations. She has also made for me a purple stole for use during the seasons of Advent and Lent, and paraments for our altar in La Caramuca. Our altar consists of a green plastic table about the size of a card table, but without foldable legs. Nevertheless, it looks fairly impressive when covered with the white altar-cloth bearing the alpha and omega symbols in front.

Others who made presentations at the workshop included:

• Natasha Sanchez of La Fortaleza Lutheran Church in Maracay, banners and vestments;
• Luis Miguel Silva, La Fortaleza, wooden crosses and other items crafted from wood and leather;
• Pastor Luis Moya of La Reforma Lutheran Church, San Felix de Guayana, speaking on behalf of his wife, who makes banners and vestments;
• Yepci Santana, Corpus Christi Lutheran Church of Barinas, banners.

In addition, I presented slides of the wrought-iron version of Luther's seal incorporated into the gates of our mission in La Caramuca and the work that inspired it, the windows of Roca de Eternidad (Rock of Ages) Lutheran Church, Quebrada Seca, Monagas. Like many buildings in rural Venezuela, the church in Quebrada Seca does not have glassed windows, but rather ironwork on the outside of the windows to keep out intruders. And the ironwork in every window in Roca de Eternidad has symbols of the Holy Trinity, Baptism, Creation and other themes.

I also showed a picture of the beautiful Advent wreath made for Corpus Christi by Ludy de Tarrazona (the one that caught on fire).

Everyone was excited by the talent and resources on display. There were four major concerns:

1. That Christian art might give members of Lutheran congregations an avenue to use their God-given talents;
2. That promotion of Christian art might preserve Venezuelan folk arts and crafts, which some fear are in danger of disappearing;
3. That artistic expression through liturgical tradition might help the Lutheran Church of Venezuela develop a distinctive identity in Venezuela and a sense of solidarity with other confessional Lutheran church-bodies throughout the world.
4. That liturgical art might serve to express and teach Lutheran doctrine.

Workshop participants favored the inclusion of formal art courses in the curriculum of the Juan de Frias Theological Institute and the formation of committees to promote Christian art in every congregation.

International perspective on abortion

This week marks a definite regime change in the United States as well as the 36^th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court's Roe vs. Wade decision, which legalized abortion on demand. Exit George W. Bush, whose record shows him to have been the most pro-life President so far, and enter Barack Obama, who at the very least promises to be the most pro-abortion President ever.

Here is an on-line chart which shows the status of abortion laws in nearly every country in the world as of 2007. You may notice that while abortion on demand tends to be the rule in the United States and Europe, Latin America is something of a mixed bag. Here in Venezuela, abortion is only legal in situations where the life of the prospective mother might be endangered by bringing the baby to term. Neighboring Colombia is more permissive in regard to abortion than Venezuela (although I am told pious, practicing Roman Catholics are more common there), but more restrictive than the United States. Direct abortion is illegal under any circumstances in El Salvador, Nicaragua and Chile, although the Chilean government in 2006 authorized the sale of the abortifacient "morning-after" birth control pill.

This Sunday Bolivians will vote on a new constitution that, if ratified, would throw open the door to elective abortion. Please pray for Bolivia and also for other nations that are under pressure to change pro-life stands.

Please pray also for the United States and other nations that, hardened in sin, refuse to recognize the sanctity of human life and marriage, and the rights of the unborn, that they may repent before judgment falls.

Advent wreath ablaze!

It can terribly distracting when the entire Advent wreath catches on fire during the worship service.

Here is how it happened: Corpus Christi Lutheran Church does not have air-conditioning nor what we North Americans would call “storm windows”. Most of the windows in the church are protected by a wrought-iron framework which includes louvered glass panes which may
be closed in the event of rain. The window nearest the altar, however, only has iron bars to keep out intruders, but no louvered glass.

Often we have trouble keeping the candles on the altar lit when there is a good, stiff breeze blowing. This time, however, the problem was not keeping the candles lit. Rather, the breeze fanned the flames into a close encounter with less-than-fireproof material.

Luckily, there was no serious property damage, although Virginia Jimenez burned her finger helping me put out the fire.

The beautiful Advent wreath, with four blue candles and one white Christmas candle, was made by Ludy de Tarazona, a member of Corpus Christi. We thank God that it served its purpose in marking the weeks of Advent before this unfortunate incident and that it almost certainly can be repaired for continued use. We also give thanks that the Advent season and Christmas Day passed with little incident and the receipt of many gifts, including hallacas (the traditional
Venezuelan Christmas dish) and a bottle of wine from the older fellow who lives at the bottom of our hill.

There were more than 30 people in attendance at Corpus Christi on Christmas Eve. We thank God for this also, for as I have explained before, the idea of attending a midweek service is quite novel for most Venezuelans. The majority spend their Christmas/New Year vacations in the mountains or on the beach, or partying at home with family and friends. We had no December 25 service, so Sunday, December 28, was our Christmas service, more or less. There were about 20 in attendance.

That same Sunday I also led a complete worship service in La Caramuca, with Holy Communion for our confirmed young people. Eduardo Flores said his farewell to Corpus Christi and returned to Caracas after Christmas Eve. Corpus Christi still does not have its own pastor, so this is the plan for now: I will lead the service and distribute Holy Communion every Sunday morning at Corpus Christi and every Sunday afternoon in La Caramuca.

Alonso Franco will arrive in January to serve as vicar at Corpus Christi for three months, thus sharing some of the load. We look forward to seeing Alonso, because he and his parents, Pastor Alcides and Nancy, are old friends of Luz Maria and her children. Luz Maria considered Alcides Franco her mentor in the faith during the years she lived in San Felix de Guayana.

Remembering the Holy Innocents

According to the church calendar, December 28 is always the day dedicated to the Holy Innocents of Bethlehem, the male children that King Herod slaughtered in his rage against the newborn Christ (with whom Joseph and Mary fled to Egypt), and to Christian martyrs around the world. I would recommend the Web site, www.persecution.net, for learning about the more obvious ways in which Christians are persecuted today and how Christians in many parts of the world do not have the blessing of religious liberty that Christians have in the United States. The Web site is sponsored by “Voice of the Martyrs”, an organization founded by Richard Wurmbrand.

It was about 20 years ago that a friend gave me copies of Wurmbrand's books, “Tortured for Christ” and “In God's Underground”. Born a Romanian Jew, Wurmbrand flirted with Marxism
as a young man, converted to Christianity and eventually was ordained a Lutheran pastor. He was imprisoned for many years by the Romanian Communists. He at last found political asylum in the United States and western Europe.

Of course, this year December 28 also was the first Sunday after Christmas, so although I mentioned persecuted Christians in the general prayer, we used the Scripture lessons appointed for the first Sunday after Advent rather than the Day of the Holy Innocents.

Historic lectionary a help

Starting with this liturgical year, the Lutheran Church of Venezuela has returned to “the historic one-year lectionary”. The practice of preaching from a text appointed for the day predates the New Testament. When Jesus revealed Himself as the Messiah in the Nazareth synagogue, according to Luke 4:16-21, He preached from Isaiah 61:1-2, the appointed reading for that day. Various other passages in the New Testament indicate that the early Christians continued the practice of Scripture readings as they did much of the rest of Jewish liturgical tradition.

The church calendar developed as a way of rehearsing, through the course of the year, the important events in the life of Christ, especially His birth, passion and resurrection. A common lectionary designed to follow this annual cycle first appeared in 471 A.D. Further standardization of the lectionary occurred 300 years later in western Christendom under the reign of Charlemagne. Finally, by the end of the 13^th Century, the lectionary had taken the form
it would retain until 1969.

In that year, the Roman Catholic Church abandoned the one-year lectionary in favor of a three-year cycle of Scriptural lessons. In a fit of ecumenical fervor, Episcopalians, Lutherans, Presbyterians and other Protestant church-bodies followed suit. The reasons given for this change were that:

1. The three-year cycle would give pastors a wider range of Scripture verses on which to base their sermons, and;

2. Increase Biblical literacy among the laity.
   

Ironically, although the one-year lectionary had been used by Catholics and Protestants alike for nearly 400 years, the united front for the three-year lectionary soon began to splinter. Each
denomination began revising it, until each had their own distinct version.

Never mind the Catholics, Anglicans and Presbyterians. The Thrivent pastor's agenda that I was given to use for 2008 has three different Lutheran versions of the Series “A” readings for each Sunday: one for the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), one for the Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod and one for the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod (the Lutheran Church of Venezuela followed the WELS version last year). Personally I found it difficult to just glance at the agenda to make sure I had the right lesson in hand when my eyes had to run down the list of the three versions.

My point being, the three-year lectionary does not make preaching easier for novices like myself. I find the one-year lectionary simpler and more useful. Also, the idea behind a common lectionary never was to “widen options” but to sharpen the focus of preaching throughout the church and discourage pastors from using the Christian pulpit as a soapbox for their personal opinions.

As for increasing Biblical literacy among the laity, a review of research by George Barna and associates will reveal how unsuccessful the three-year lectionary has been at achieving this goal.

Finally, one great advantage to the one-year lectionary is the rich heritage of hymnody, sermons and other liturgical resources that have been based on it. There is much material from which to draw inspiration, including the sermons of Martin Luther himself. Concordia Publishing House
just released a volume of Luther's sermons translated into Spanish that I purchased through the Juan de Frias Theological Institute for about $8. However, Luz Maria grabbed it and won't let me have it until she is done reading it.

Workshop on Christian art

Luz Maria has been organizing a workshop on Christian art to be held in Caracas on January 9. The idea came to her after the ordination service in December. As part of our ordination, Eduardo, Sergio and I were presented with red stoles (symbolic of Pentecost, the season of the Holy Spirit) hand-made by Yoxandris Marcano, a young woman from Monagas. Yoxandris also made a beautiful green stole (for the Trinity season on the church calendar) for her boyfriend,
Sergio.

Also, the three pastors from La Reforma Lutheran Church in San Felix de Guayana – Alcides Franco, Jonathan Franco and Luis Moya – wore elegant chasubles made by Luis' wife. The chasuble is a poncho-like garment which, according to the ancient liturgical tradition, is worn over the alb and stole by the presiding pastor during the service of Holy Communion. During the 16^th Century, Lutheran pastors wore chasubles as a matter of course, but with the rise of Pietism in the late 17^th Century and the continuing influence of Calvinism, many such “high church” accoutrements were abandoned. The anti-liturgical influence was particularly strong in the United States, where the strains of Pietism, Calvinism and Arminianism have formed the basis of popular religion from the nation's beginning. In recent years the chasuble has been reintroduced in some Lutheran churches in North America and now, apparently in Venezuela.

I should explain that, despite external pressures, Lutherans historically have held to the “normative principle of worship”, which may be summed up as saying that the ancient traditions of the church should be preserved as long as they do not conflict with the doctrines of Holy Scripture. This is opposed to the “regulative principle of worship” held by Calvinists, Arminians and Anabaptists, which says that only practices explicitly commanded in Scripture may be allowed in public worship. Once this principle was taken to the extreme of prohibiting all musical instruments (because none are mentioned in the New Testament) and all hymns other than
metrical versions of the Psalms (in England, the Puritans advocated “the iron rule of psalmody”).

The Westminster Confession states:

"The acceptable way of worshipping the true God is instituted by Himself, and so limited by His own revealed will, that He may not be worshipped according to the imaginations and devices of men, or the suggestions of Satan, under any visible representation, or any other way not prescribed in the Holy Scripture." (WCF 21.1)

Nowadays many churches in the Reformed tradition allow “contemporary Christian music” and “praise bands”, but remain fairly hostile to the use of visual arts which do not require a video screen. In Venezuela, many “evangelical” churches take this to the extreme of not allowing even plain crosses, much less crucifixes (with the image of Christ), set up inside or outside their sanctuaries. The only way you can tell these churches from public auditoriums is the presences of plaques bearing Bible verses on the back walls.

It is for this reason that one of our neighbors in La Caramuca, a staunch Roman Catholic, declared that the spread of Protestantism within the community was destroying traditional Christmas customs (such as the construction of elaborate manger scenes, which Venezuelan evangelicals regard as idolatry).

In contrast, the Lutheran Confessions say:

“Falsely are our churches accused of abolishing the Mass; for the Mass is retained among us, and celebrated with the highest reverence. Nearly all the usual ceremonies are also preserved, save
that the parts sung in Latin are interspersed here and there with German hymns, which have been added to teach the people.” (Augsburg Confession, Article XXIV: Of the Mass)

“At the outset we must again make the preliminary statement that we do not abolish the Mass, but religiously maintain and defend it. For among us masses are celebrated every Lord's Day and on the other festivals, in which the Sacrament is offered to those who wish to use it, after they have been examined and absolved. And the usual public ceremonies are observed, the series of lessons, of prayers, vestments, and other like things.” (Apology of the Augsburg Confession, Article XXIV (XII), Of the Mass)

“For although the holy Fathers themselves had both rites and traditions, yet they did not hold that these matters are useful or necessary for justification; they did not obscure the glory and office of Christ, but taught that we are justified by faith for Christ's sake, and not for the sake of these human services. But they observed human rites for the sake of bodily advantage, that the people might know at what time they should assemble; that, for the sake of example all things in the churches might be done in order and becomingly; lastly, that the common people might receive a sort of training. For the distinctions of times and the variety of rites are of service in
admonishing the common people. The Fathers had these reasons for maintaining the rites, and for these reasons we also judge it to be right that traditions [good customs] be maintained.” (Apology of the Augsburg Confesson, Article XV (VIII): Of Human Traditions in the Church)

The Lutheran Reformers realized that certain rites and practices, while not absolutely required by Holy Scripture, were valuable in a number of ways, for example, as visual aids in teaching
the people. Stained-glass windows originally were a way of illustrating Bible stories for a largely illiterate population.And, of course, music and visual arts provide avenues of artistic expressions for believers as signs of their devotion to God.

Which is what Luz Maria's workshop will be about. In addition to the examples that I mentioned above, many members of the Lutheran Church of Venezuela have demonstrated their talents in the making of stained glass, baptismal fonts, crosses and crucifixes and in other ways. Luz Maria has been very pleased with the enthusiastic response to the workshop so far.

What about Papa Noel?

During Advent we covered the Nativity story with the Sunday school children. But one boy asked, “What about Papa Noel?” Papa Noel is another name for Santa Claus in Venezuela. The boy was particularly interested because his name is Jefferson Noel, his brother's name is
Noel Alexander, and his sister's name is Genesis Noeli.

So I told him that Papa Noel was really Nicholas, bishop of the city of Myra, in what is now Turkey, in the fourth century after Christ. Once there was a very poor couple who had three
daughters. It was the custom in those days that the family had to provide a dowry for each daughter to get married. This family did not have any money, so it appeared the girls had no other options in life but to become prostitutes. Nicholas gathered up enough gold coins to
provide each of the three with a dowry, put the money in three bags and in the dead of night threw the bags through a window in the family's home. That is how the legend of Papa Noel, or Santa Claus, got started.

I did not tell him my favorite part of the real St. Nicholas story: How the bishop of Myra attended the Council of Nicaea as a defender of Trinitarian doctrine against the heresy of Arianism and how he supposedly punched the arch-heretic Arius right in the face!

With that image of “action hero Santa” in mind, I wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a prosperous New Year.

Baptisms, confirmations and impending ordination

Well, more baptisms and confirmations.

Maria de los Angeles Brito was baptized in La Caramuca, Saturday, Novermber 29, 2008. Maria actually lives in Barinas and attends Corpus Christi Lutheran Church, but her father wanted to attend her baptism and was not able to do so on Sunday, November 30. So Maria was baptized by Pastor Ted Krey on his last official visit to Barinas and we had our second service of Holy Communion for the newly confirmed in our mission. I am happy to report that Sandro Pérez was once again released from the hospital and was able to attend.

The following day there were three baptisms and four confirmations at Corpus Christi. The children baptized were Moisés, Olgret and Ricardo Rivero. Confirmands were Maria Brito, Maria Eugenia Vera, Yelitza Pérez and Luís Eduardo Jimenez. Since Eduardo Flores personally instructed these four young people, it was a great way for him to end his year of vicarage in Barinas.

Eduardo and I will be in Caracas this week, preparing for our ordinations on Saturday, December 13. I have received and accepted a call from the Lutheran Church of Venezuela to serve as a missionary in western Venezuela. I will be based in La Caramuca (and authorized to preach and administer the sacraments there, but also will have the privilege and responsibility of searching for new locations to plant churches (we already have made some contacts in the neighboring state of Apure, for example).)

Eduardo and our fellow “seminarista” Sergio Maita will be ordained and installed as instructors at the “mini-seminary” that has been established in Caracas. Sergio has completed his vicarage at Cristo Rey (Christ the King) Lutheran Church in the eastern city of Maturin. In addition to teaching new seminaristas (there are six prospects so far for this next year), Eduardo and Sergio will take turns serving the congregations of La Paz (Peace) and La Santa Trinidad (Holy Trinity) in Caracas. Neither of these congregations have full-time pastors.

Pastor Abel García, director of the Juan de Frias Theological Institute, will be moving from the city of Barcelona, Venezuela, to Caracas in order to supervise the seminary.

The Juan de Frias Theological Institute was founded by Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod missionaries 45 years ago and based on the concept of theological education by extension (TEE). This concept, TEE, was pioneered by Presbyterians in Guatemala in 1963 as a way of meeting some of the challenges of training pastors within a Latin American cultural context.

After some apparent initial success, the TEE model became widely promoted throughout Latin America by many denominations. But, in Venezuela at least, after 45 years that as a total replacement for a seminary education, TEE leaves something to be desired.

The New Testament does not mandate any specific method for training pastors. We have the example of Jesus teaching the Scriptures in the typical manner of a Jewish rabbi, and selecting 12 men from among those who listened to His teachings. To these men He gave special training for three years before commissioning them as apostles (there were, of course, only 11 by that time, Judas Iscariot having dropped out of the program in a spectacular fashion). So according to the model of our Lord Himself, there should be several years of preparation and examination before one is qualified to receive a call into the public ministry.

This preparation does not involve only “book learning”. We read later in the New Testament that although Saul of Tarsus was highly educated by both Jewish and Greco-Roman standards, approximately 17 years passed between the time of his conversion and when he was ready to embark on his first missionary journey as the Apostle Paul (Galations 1:16-2:1). Preparation for the public ministry is a matter of character formation as well as intellectual development.

Finally, we may note the importance of Biblical instruction starting in early childhood for Paul's protege, Timothy. Before receiving Paul's special training, Timothy was taught the basic doctrines of the Holy Scriptures by his mother and grandmother (2 Timothy 1:5, 3:14-16).

It also is important to consider that the original 12 apostles were devout Jews, too. Jews in the first century A.D., like Jews today, placed a great deal of importance on religious education. So, despite being “simple” fishermen and tradesmen, they did not start from a position of ignorance when Jesus chose them as his disciples.

The modern, North American system of recruiting young men for the seminary presupposes this kind of religious upbringing. The grooming of a pastoral candidate from early childhood on can greatly speed up the process of pastoral formation. In addition, a shared faith motivates a family to make the sacrifices necessary to support the prospective pastor for four years of college plus four years in the seminary.

Beyond the family, Missouri Synod Lutherans historically have recognized the importance of undergirding seminary training with formal Christian education at all levels. This is why the Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod developed the second-largest network of private preschools, elementary schools and colleges in the United States (surpassed only by the Roman Catholic Church).

One problem throughout much of Latin America is these preconditions for seminary training often do not exist (although there are Lutheran seminaries in the larger, more prosperous countries of Brazil and Argentina). In Venezuela, second- or third-generation Lutherans are rare birds. Members of the Lutheran Church of Venezuela often are the only members of their extended families who are practicing Christians of any sort. So the young man who wants to become a pastor may not have a role model within the family to emulate, plus the family may not be keen on the idea of the young man being taken out of the workforce for eight years only to receive wages considerably less than what he could expect in a secular profession that required an equal amount of education.

Likewise, in Venezuela even the Roman Catholic Church does not support the vast network of parochial schools that one sees in the United States.

Then there is in Latin America the wide cultural gap between those who have received some form of higher education and those who have not. This gap exists to some extent in the United States between those who have gone from high school to four-year liberal arts colleges and classmates who ended their formal education with a high school diploma or maybe two years at a technical college or business school, but the difference in Venezuela and other Latin American countries is much more pronounced. Young people who have left their rural village or urban slum for the university may find it very difficult to reassimilate into their old community.

The TEE alternative is to offer theological training to people already recognized as leaders within their communities without requiring them to change their place of residence or abandon their means of earning a living. The students are given printed materials to study on their own time and meet periodically with an instructor to discuss and review what should have been learned. The student can take as many courses as desired and advance at his or her own pace. Involvement with a local congregation is supposed to provide the opportunity for practical application of the knowledge acquired.

Over the past 45 years, the Juan de Frias Theological Institute has offered theological education by extension to all interested parties, with the proviso that one must complete the more basic courses before continuing to a more advanced level. This approach has proved successful in providing laypeople with the basic grounding in Christian doctrine that they may not have received as children or teenagers.

As a method of training pastors, TEE has proved to have a number of shortcomings:

1. It assumes an extraordinary degree of self-discipline on the part of the pastoral candidate, assuming that he will devote himself to daily study for an indefinite period while working to support himself and his family, and assuming leadership responsibilities within a local congregation. The result is a high drop-out rate as students become discouraged by these demands. I should also note that in Venezuela it is, in the first place, quite difficult to find a) a job that b) pays enough to support a family while c) allowing one enough free time for night courses and church activities.
2. The Lutheran Church of Venezuela is struggling to fill its existing pulpits in the face of an urgent need for pastors to plant new churches. Doors are open that probably will not remain so permanently. Yet training pastors solely by TEE has proven extremely time-consuming. The historical average for achieving the training needed for the pastoral ministry by means of Juan de Frias TEE courses is 13 years.
3. The TEE approach does not promote a sense of dedication to the pastoral office. Jesus told Peter, Andrew and the rest to leave their fishermen's nets and follow Him to the ends of the earth, if need be. He also said that heeding His call might well mean leaving family and friends behind (Mark 10:28-31, Lucas 9:59-62). He did not say, “Stay in Capernaum where you can witness to the people with whom you feel most comfortable when you have the time.” According to a Lutheran understanding of mission, not every Christian is called to be a missionary, but all pastors are called to be missionaries wherever the Lord may lead them. It is the responsibility of the whole church to send pastors to preach and (the sacraments, even into the poorest and most remote areas.

While not an inherent flaw in the strategy of theological education by extension, another problem the Lutheran Church of Venezuela must consider is this: LCMS World Missions withdrew nearly all of its ordained missionaries from Venezuela in 2003. Theodore Krey, the last LCMS-sponsored theological educator in Venezuela, will leave in January 2009. The Lutheran Church of Venezuela lacks the financial resources to support theological educators whose only task is to travel regularly to the far corners of the country to teach theological extension courses as the LCMS missionaries did.

Starting in 2006, the Juan de Frias Theological Institute has attempted to balance its TEE offerings with a program of resident or semi-resident study in a central location for pastoral candidates. Eventually this program will be supplemented by regional centers for theological education which will not only serve to teach basic doctrine to the laity, but also recruit pastoral candidates. One of our goals is to establish La Caramuca Lutheran Mission as one of these regional centers.

I began taking Juan de Frias courses during my first year in Venezuela as I realized my continued presence in Venezuela would require at least the capacity to teach Bible classes in Spanish. At first I did not seek the responsibilities of the pastoral office, but eventually I realized that our mission in La Caramuca would require the attention of a resident pastor and that I was the most likely candidate for the position. So it was a great blessing when I was invited by the national church to participate in the pastoral study program in 2007. The program requires a five-year commitment: one year of intensive, resident study; a year of vicarage; and three more years of attending seminars in Caracas and other locations.

This program has allowed me to study for the ministry without interrupting the development of our Lutheran school in western Venezuela.

Over the past five and a half years in Venezuela, I have had the privilege of receiving instruction from the following visiting profesors:

• Dr. Douglas Rutt and Dr. David Coles of Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, Indiana.
• José Pfaffenzeller, Concordia Seminary, Buenos Aires, Argentina
• Dr. Rudy Blank, Concordia Seminary, St. Louis.
• Mark Braden, pastor of Zion Lutheran Church, Cleghorn, Wisconsin, and a Greek tutor at the Fort Wayne seminary.
• Paul Brink and Henry Witte, both former missionaries to Venezuela currently serving Latino missions in Iowa.

I am grateful to these people and also to Phil Bickel, another former missionary pastor to Venezuela, and Dale Saville, agricultural missionary in eastern Venezuela, who awakened my interest in mission work as a second career and in Venezuela as a mission field.

Learning the catechism

Luz María's granddaughter, Karelis Santana, surprised me by “reading” the 10 Commandments from the Small Catechism. Actually, she is seven years old and cannot read, but she knew the commandments by heart. That was in its way even more impressive.

We also were pleasantly surprised by Leandro Zapata, a boy between 10 and 12 years of age. Every week before beginning the Sunday school lesson I lead a brief service of evening prayer. This includes an invocation, the Lord's Prayer, Apostle's Creed, a Scripture lesson and meditation, a litany, individual prayers and songs. The children take turns saying prayers, and usually they give thanks for their parents, siblings, friends, etc. However, last Sunday, without any prompting Leandro prayed for “all the children in the street who are hungry.”

We have invited the parents of four families to the prayer service and hope that soon we will have a complete worship service and Sunday school on Sunday afternoons in La Caramuca.

One lesson that I recently read to the children, John 14:15-21, seemed particularly relevant to what they are studying:

“If you love Me, keep My commandments. And I will pray to the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever – the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, for it neither sees Him or knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.

“I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you. A little while longer and the world will see Me no more, but you will see Me. Because I live, you will live also. At that day you will know that I am in My Father and you in Me, and I in you. He that has My commandments, it is he that loves Me. And he that loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and manifest Myself to him.”

Thus, I explained, we memorize God's commandments to keep them, not because we fear God's wrath, but because of the love God has shown us in sending Jesus to die on the cross for our sins that we may live as children of God. Furthermore, God has sent us His Holy Spirit to give us the strength to live according to God's holy will and has promised eternal life to those who love Him. But those who reject God´s mercy in Christ and the gift of the Holy Spirit will one day know the wrath of the one truly righteous and incorruptible Judge.

On Mondays, the preschool week begins with the singing of the Venezuelan national anthem. Following this, I lead the children (those old enough to follow, anyway) in the Lord's Prayer and read a simple Bible verse, for example, John 3:16 or Romans 8:28.

On April 25, 2008, I had the privilege of reading several Scripture verses at the wedding of Lusveidis Pinzon and Luís Orellana at Corpus Christi Lutheran Church in Barinas. Pastor Ted Krey traveled from Caracas to perform the actual wedding rite, while my fellow vicar Eduardo Flores lead the congregational singing with his guitar. Two sisters, Angly and Zoivy Vargas, sang a duet. Rafael Flores, Eduardo's brother, and Isaac Machado, son of José and Elsy Machado, served as ushers. Both of these young men are studying for the ministry with Pastor Krey in Caracas.

Lusveidis is a longtime member of the church and there were many people at the wedding. Fortunately, the church's seating capacity has been greatly expanded. Corpus Christi has undergone a lot of physical changes in this past year. The building was once a bar, and for the first few years that the congregation occupied the site, there would be drunks wandering in on Sunday morning (!) and trying to order spirits of a different sort. Now, however, it is looking more and more like a church, especially with the front entrance consisting of double doors inlaid with stained glass. Of course, there is also the new kitchen and bathroom facilities, meeting room for Sunday school and weekday classes, and the apartment where Eduardo lives.

April 25 was also that the day that Luz María's youngest grandchild so far, Edwar José Garrida, marked his first year of life. Edwar's mother, Sarai, is carrying Edwar's sister, so soon there will be a total of seven grandchildren.

I have found that in writing sermons, many times the chosen text speaks to me as much as to anyone else. This was certainly case for Sunday, April 13, 2008. The Gospel text was John 10:1-10:

“Most assuredly I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door, but climbs up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber. But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him the doorkeeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice; and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. And when he brings out his own sheep, he goes before them; and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice. Yet they will by no means follow a stranger, but will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers.

“Jesus used this illustration, but they did not understand the things which He spoke to them.

“Then Jesus said again, “Most assuredly I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. All who ever came before Me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not hear them. I am the door. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out, and find pasture. The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and may have it abundantly.”

The most obvious lesson in this passage is that there is only one way to heaven – through faith in Jesus as the incarnate Son of God who died on the Cross the sins of everyone and who rose again on the third day. This passage immediately precedes the perhaps more familiar verse where Jesus identifies Himself as the Good Shepherd. Typically in Palestine, a sheepfold is a corral surrounded by a high stone wall with a single door in and out. A watchman guards the door and only opens it for those he knows as the true shepherds of the sheep. The stone wall not only keeps out wolves and other four-legged predators, but also the two-legged kind who would also rob and kill the sheep.

Anyone who teaches that there is a way to heaven other than through Christ is a spiritual predator who does not have your best interests at heart. These are the thieves and robbers. Christ Himself, of course, is the true Shepherd, the one to whom the sheep belong. Then there are the watchmen or gatekeepers, who Martin Luther in one of his sermons identified as the Old Testament prophets, the Twelve Apostles and nowadays those of us who are entrusted with the public preaching of God's Word. Our solemn duty is not to allow anyone but Christ access to His flock. When we preach, we preach in His name and if the sheep do not hear His voice – that is to say, God's Word – in our preaching, they are right to flee from us. We must also encourage the sheep to study the Word and learn to recognize His voice.

Here is another way to look at it. I gather that it is not the custom in Palestine or most of the Middle East to use sheepdogs to herd the flocks. But to my more European way of thinking, this makes sense: We are the dogs of Christ. It is up to us to guard the flock from the false prophets, the teachers of false doctrine, even, with God's help, those enemies of God's people who are more than flesh and blood.

My sermon text for March 30, 2008, the second Sunday of Easter, was John 20:19-31. This passage is understood as the institution of the office of the public ministry, for Jesus breathes on his 11 chosen disciples and tells them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven. If you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” The parallel passage in Mark 16:14-18 identifies this forgiving and retaining of sins with the preaching of the Gospel: “Go into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature. He who believes and is baptized will be saved, but he who does not believe will be condemned.” And likewise in Luke 24:46-47: “Thus it is written, and thus it was necessary for the Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day, and that repentance and remission of sins be preached in His name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.”

But of course, the most well-known parallel to this sermon text from John is Matthew 28:19-20, otherwise known as the Great Commission: “Go therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and, lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

I have found it very helpful to think of the Great Commission in this context, as it seems there is much confusion on this point. The command to preach, administer the sacraments and make disciples of all nations is indeed given to the church as a whole, but indirectly. The command was directly given to those whom Christ had called to be his apostles, and today it is given to those who the church has called to be pastors in Christ's name. This is why Article XIV of the Augsburg Confession declares, “no one should publicly teach in the Church or administer the Sacraments unless he be regularly called.”

The missionary task of the church is the establishment of congregations where believers may gather around the preaching of the Word and the administration of the sacraments, and where unbelievers may hear both Law and Gospel proclaimed. “Friendship evangelism” (laypeople showing Christian love toward their neighbors, talking about their faith and inviting friends and relatives to attend church with them) is the fruit of Word-and-sacrament ministry, but not the basis of missionary activity. Once formed, every congregation has the right and responsibility to call a pastor, therefore it is the responsibility of the church as a whole to provide qualified men to answer these calls.

When I first came to Venezuela, I had the idea of serving as some sort of support person for the national Lutheran clergy. Then I realized that what the Lutheran Church of Venezuela desperately needed was not so much support personnel as those who could be authorized to preach and teach. As I came to a clearer understanding of mission and ministry, I realized that God had led me to a place where I could do nothing else but seek ordination and a call to serve as a true missionary in La Caramuca.

Fence-building again

We finally have resumed construction of the gated wall around our property. There still are periodic shortages of cement, to the pointwhere the federal government has ordered the nationalization of the cement industry. There continue to be food shortages as well. One local newpaper, De Frente, said the purchase of chicken, beef and milk has become like a lottery:
You just have to be in the right store at the right time because there is no guarantee as to when and how much of these items will be stocked.

Nevertheless, we were able to buy some cement. Luz María's son, Pedro, this week began clearing part of the property for laying the foundation of the wall facing the street. Specifically, he and another fellow cut down the mango tree with large branches that would have been in the way. There were other problems with the tree. In Venezuela, mangos grow in nearly everyone's backyard, so if the tree produces more than your family and friends can consume, there is not really a market for the excess fruit. Keeping the yard clear of rotting mangos is really a chore. The tree also was a magnet for local boys who threw stones to knock down the fruit hanging high in the tree. Recently one boy threw a stone hard enough and far enough to shatter the glass in our bedroom window. So, all things considered, it was time for the mango tree to go.

The last week of March, Eduardo and I traveled to Barquisimeto for a seminar on urban missions at El Paraiso Lutheran Church. The seminar was taught by Jim Tino, a former Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod missionary to Venezuela. El Paraiso actually is located in Cabudare, a suburb of Barquisimeto. The church compound is like a little garden of Eden with many rare plants.

There were perhaps 40 to 50 people in the seminar and even more showed up that weekend for the ordination of Miguelángel Perez. As a national missionary, Miguelángel will serve as pastor to the two Lutheran Church of Venezuela member-congregations in Barquisimeto, El Paraiso and Cristo es Amor (Christ is Love). Eduardo stayed for the ordination, but returned to Barinas Saturday to lead the Sunday service at Corpus Christi Lutheran Church.

I left the seminar with these thoughts about our mission in La Caramuca:


In the Lutheran Church of Venezuela's eastern zone you may find the largest and most stable congregations in the national church, such as Cristo Rey (Christ the King) in Maturin. These are the legacy of Heinrich Zeuch, a Lutheran deacon who came to Venezuela to start a new life after his family's home in Germany was destroyed by Allied bombing during World War II. Zeuch worked at a variety jobs in the agricultural sector in the eastern state of Monagas, all the while starting Bible study and prayer groups. When LCMS missionaries in Caracas heard of what Zeuch was doing in the early 1950s, they quickly contacted him and saw to it that he was ordained as a missionary pastor. The Zeuch family eventually moved to Brazil, but the rural congregations planted by Heinrich Zeuch continued to thrive and serve as seedbeds for congregations in the more highly populated areas of eastern Venezuela.

As in the United States and much of the rest of the world, the tremendous increases in agricultural productivity over the last 100 years in Venezuela greatly reduced the need for unskilled farm labor and spurred emigration to urban industrial areas. Venezuela, which perhaps experienced the most rapid urbanization of any Latin American country, has been ill-equipped to deal with the growth of urban masses, many of whom found the promise of better-paying jobs in the city to be an illusion.

But thanks to a generally high birth rate, rural populations in Venezuela have not declined that much, despite emigration to the cities. Rural Venezuelans face many of the same problems as urban Venezuelans: poverty, alcohol and drug abuse, family instability, lack of any sense of a higher purpose in life. But because economic and human resources have been shifted to urban areas to deal with the high concentrations of people there, rural communities in this most "urbanized" South American nation are more isolated than ever.

For a time families from the rural churches of Monagas served as nuclei for new urban churches. But then a decision was made to move North American missionaries, upon whom the Lutheran Church of Venezuela still was highly dependent, completely out of rural ministries into the cities because "that is where the people are." But this decision to "follow the numbers" proved to be a mistake.

The rural churches were not prepared to deal with this shift and fell into decline. With the seedbeds in disrepair, a generation of leadership was lost. Now, with the withdrawal of nearly all LCMS missionaries from Venezuela (and, in fact, from nearly all of Latin America), the Lutheran Church of Venezuela is in crisis. With a total membership of only about a 1,000 in a nation of 26 million people, there still are not enough pastors to serve all of the exisiting congregations, much less do evangelistic outreach. In Caracas, Venezuela's largest city, the Lutheran Church of Venezuela has only three member-congregations and only one of those is served by a full-time pastor.

Tierra de Gracia agricultural mission, where I served as a lay volunteer when I came to Venezuela, was set up in Monagas to help revive the rural churches there.

Its objectives include:

• Help farm laborers improve their skills and opportunities for employment.


• Evangelize those who work on the farm and their surrounding communities.


• Support evangelization in rural areas and pastoral care in the existing rural churches.

Here in western Venezuela we do not have the historic base that the churches in Monagas have. But we think the development of Christian education in our rural zone can solve this problem. With the availability of quality Christian education, many would not have to leave the area to improve their skills and prospects in life. At the same time, those that did move to the city would be prepared to serve as lay leaders and full-time church workers there. Actually, it is easier for a person from the country to adapt to city life than a city person to adapt to the country.

We have historical examples of how this could work. For example, in the 19th Century Wilhelm Loehe trained and sent Lutheran missionaries to North America, Australia, New Guinea, Brazil, and the Ukraine from Neuendettelsau, a small town in Bavaria.

Likewise, what would become Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, began as a one-room school 100 miles south of St. Louis in rural Perry County, Missouri. Today the seminary has more than 800 students from around the world.

Concordia University of Seward, Nebraska (population 6,500), since 1894 has trained teachers and candidates for the seminary among the cornfields of eastern Nebraska.

From 1893 until 1986, St. John's College of Winfield, Kansas, did the same amid the Flint Hills of Kansas and Oklahoma.

That is why at La Caramuca Lutheran Mission we have these goals;

• To provide Christian education for children from preschool through sixth grade.


• To establish a Lutheran congregation to support the school and serve the surrounding community.


• To establish an educational center for the training of pastors,
  teachers and evangelists for the Andes and Venezuelan Plains regions.

Christ for all the nations

Our Sunday school lesson for the second Sunday in Lent was based on the Gospel of John, chapter 4: The story of Jesus and the Samaritan woman at the well. In fact, there are many lessons to be learned from this single story, including:

• The Gospel is to be preached to every nation and tribe, including racial/ethnic groups that have had centuries of conflict with your own, as in the case of the Jews and Samaritans;
• The Jews, not the Samaritans, had the full revelation of God's will and followed the moral and ceremonial laws that God had dictated to their forefathers, it was not the keeping of these God-given laws that made them right with God (for all failed to obey God's Law perfectly);
• Rather, it was faith in the promise of God's Messiah that saved Abraham and other Old Testament believers from God's wrath (Romans 4:1-5, 13-17).
• The Samaritans,too, kne w of the promised Messiah, although they accepted only part of God's inspired Word and mixed it with their own human traditions. Jesus revealed Himself to the Samaritan woman as the Messiah anticipated by both Jews and Samaritans.
• The crossing of political, cultural and religious boundaries with the Gospel can be a difficult, even physically demanding task, which is why God ordained an office of the public ministry, men dedicated to preaching the Word and administering the sacraments wherever the Lord might call them;
• Once the seed is planted, however, the church may grow rapidly through ordinary people, like the Samaritan woman, witnessing to their neighbors;
• It was by the touching of the Samaritan woman's conscience with God's Law that Jesus penetrated her defenses and brought her the Gospel.

We focused on the last point with the children, emphasizing that God knows all of our faults, but given true repentance and a contrite heart, there is no sin that can keep us from reconciliation with God, for He does not will our destruction, but rather our redemption. Given the nature of the Samaritan woman's sin (she had been married and divorced five time and was living with a man to whom she was not married) Luz María saw a opportunity to talk with them about issues that they would face once they passed puberty – such as HIV/AIDS infection.

Thanks to a 2001 decision by the Supreme Court of Venezuela, every citizen infected with the HIV virus is guaranteed free treatment withantiretroviral drugs, the first ruling of its kind in Latin America.

The cost of this treatment is substantial, about 1,000 U.S. dollars per month. Venezuela imports generic antiretroviral medications from Cuba and India in order to meet the country’s demand. However, because of budget problems and poor planning, not all people living with HIV/AIDS in Venezuela have had access to the treatment. It is believed that hundreds of infected individuals have fled Venezuela for the United States and Canada in search of better treatment.

In addition, Venezuela experienced a dramatic increase in the number of adults (15 to 49 years of age) reported to be infected with the HIV virus from around 62,000 in 2003 to 110,000 in 2004. This 77 percent increase raised Venezuela's ranking among the 100 nations with the highest incidence of HIV/AIDS from 53^rd to 49^th place. Even more disturbing is the increased number of women infected with the HIV virus. In the early 1990s, women accounted for one out of every 18 people in Venezuela infected with HIV, but today they account for 31,000 of the 110,000 infected with HIV/AIDS, about one out of four. In 2005, deaths attributed to HIV infection totaled 6,100 (technically no one dies of HIV/AIDS; rather the virus destroys the immune system, allowing other infections (that the body would normally be able to resist) to claim a life).

The number of HIV-infected Venezuelans has remained stable at around 110,000 for the last four years, according to estimates by the United Nations AIDS Program. Currently, Venezuelans infected with the HIV virus represent 0.7 percent of the country's population of more than 27.5 million. In comparison, the percentage of U.S. citizens infected with the HIV/AIDS virus is about 0.6 percent of the total U.S. population.

According to a World Bank report, at the end of 2007 there were around 1.6 million people living with HIV in Latin America - more than in the United States, Canada, Japan and the United Kingdom combined. More than half of Latin Americans living with HIV reside in the region’s four largest countries: Brazil, Colombia, Mexico and Argentina.

Brazil is home to 600,000 people living with HIV – more than any other Latin American country – but due to the large size of its population, this equates to a relatively low HIV prevalence of 0.5
percent. The most severe epidemics are found in smaller countries such as Honduras and Belize, where the percentages of the HIV-infected are 1.5 percent and 2.5 percent respectively.

Of course, we did not hit the children with all these facts and figures. Instead, we emphasized that the possibility of HIV/AIDS infection was one reason why sex outside of marriage could have serious consequences for their lives and the lives of others. God designed marriage as a lifelong commitment between one man and one woman, and when people try to step outside that design, all kinds of problems result.

Also, Luz María emphasized, one should not make such a commitment based on qualities that may fade with time, but rather seek the kind of person who can maintain a lifelong relationship – and help strengthen you in your relationship with God.

Eduardo Flores continues to add a lot to our program, especially in the area of music. He has been teaching new songs to the Sunday school, preschool and the congregation in Barinas. Eduardo has a deep appreciation of the rich heritage of Christian liturgy and music. Click on the audio player to hear him singing and playing guitar for an arrangement of Luther's hymn, “Lord, Keep Us Steadfast In Thy Word.”

During the third week of Lent, Corpus Christi Lutheran Church celebrated its 13^th anniversary at its present location. At a special prayer vigil, 7 p.m. to midnight that Friday, Eduardo, Luz María and I led a three-part study on the history and heritage of the church.

I began with a look at the early church and how the first Christians, all Jews by birth or adult converts to Judaism, considered the Gospel of Christ to be the fulfillment, not the negation of Old Testament teaching. Thus they continued the highly liturgical worship to which they were accustomed in the Temple of Jerusalem and in the synagogues. Like the believers of the Old
Testament and the first-century church, our worship today includes the singing of the Psalms, the reading of the Holy Scriptures and public prayers. However, we do not offer sacrifices for the
propitiation of sins as they did in the Old Testament, for Christ has made the one sacrifice which covers all sins for all time on the Cross. Nevertheless, Christ is present in His body and blood in the sacrament of Holy Communion, and God speaks to us through the preaching of His Word. Our songs, prayers and offerings are sacrifices of thanksgiving for His presence among us.

Eduardo talked about the church during the Reformation and how during times of conflict and persecution, the church actually thrives more than during times of peace and plenty. He also spoke of how Martin Luther as a German belonged to a different culture, but had a side that a Latin American could understand in his love of music and children, and in his personal struggle to know God's love.

Luz María focused on the church today and its responsibility to continue its mission. The Great Commission in Matthew 28:19-20 emphasizes baptism and discipling, “teaching them all that I have commanded you.” If the church adopts “evangelism” techniques that bring in more members at the expense of sounddoctrine and instruction, it is not really being true to the mission of proclaiming the Gospel to all nations.

God's blessings to all during this Lenten season as we anticipate the joy of Easter Sunday.