I spent most of my life as a homeless Christian, confirmed in His life, sacrifice on the cross, and resurrection, but without a trusted church body to inform and strengthen that faith. In the course of time my need to find a proper church home coincided with the ability to access and compare the representations of the major options and, in a time of disabling pain and illness, I found my way into an orthodox church body that teaches Jesus and Him crucified for our, even my, salvation. Praise His holy name.
A question came up in Bible Study under the topic of communion. “Why do we need a pastor?” This raised a cavalcade of possible responses. Why do we need a pastor for communion? Because that was the context of the Words of Institution and that was the institution that comes down to us from the early Church. In the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, we hold to the true presence of Jesus Christ in the bread and the wine through the words of consecration, those words spoken by an ordained minister of God acting as a proxy for Christ, and we don’t move on to unscriptural philosophical natterings. It is recognized to be a mystery, and it is a regular and central part of orthodox Christian worship, from Eastern Orthodox to Roman Catholicism to those parts of orthodox Protestantism that hold to the real presence rather than mere symbolism. (Hearing pastors in church bodies that hold to a symbolic interpretation laugh and remind us over barbecue that He said, “this is My body,” and “this is My blood,” when the question arose made for an orthodox wedge in the Protestant formation.) And if one who says they are without sin is a liar, how is any of us to navigate the modern religious bazaar to find the narrow gate without the right teaching, the orthodoxy, presented authoritatively by a right teaching pastor?
I am thankful every day for my right teaching pastor. Sin is sin, God is God, Satan is Satan, and Jesus is, every Sunday, crucified and risen for our salvation.
Now unpack all of that for a modern American seeker that has wandered in off the street in two or three sentences. Maybe stuffed full of prosperity gospel, or that name it and claim drivel that someone told them was Christianity. You, Dr. Augustine? Maybe you, Dr. Luther? Dr. Aquinas? Dr. Chrysostom? You know where to find me when you are ready.
His peace be with you.