Twenty-three years ago, on July 15, 2001, I was ordained into the public ministry and installed as pastor of Gloria Dei Lutheran Church in Belmont, California. At that service, the congregation sang a hymn that I wrote for the occasion, “Lord Jesus Christ, our Savior-King.” That hymn is now published as hymn #899 in Christian Worship: Hymnal. I had already written a few hymn texts during my years as a seminary student — a hymn for my childhood congregation’s anniversary, a pair of hymns to serve as Gospel Acclamations for Easter, and a hymn for my class’s graduation service at Wisconsin Luther ..read more

On Sunday afternoon, September 24, 2023, my high school alma mater, Kettle Moraine Lutheran High School in Jackson, WI, celebrated its 50th school year with a special afternoon service followed by the annual President’s Dinner in the evening. The service was led by KML faculty member Pastor Benjamin Reichel. Two pastors and one seminary student who are KML alumni served as lectors for the three Scripture readings, and I was honored to be able to preach for the occasion. Former KML faculty member Brent Nolte was the guest organist, and current KML faculty member Jon Pasbrig directed the ch ..read more

This is an adaptation of a post that originally appeared on my previous blog site on May 15, 2009. This is also an expansion of comments on pages 118-119 in Christian Worship: God Gives His Gospel Gifts. This coming Sunday in the Church Year is the Sixth Sunday of Easter. The Hymn of the Day appointed for this week in Lutheran circles is Martin Luther’s 10-stanza “Dear Christians One And All Rejoice” (Christian Worship: Hymnal #557). I can imagine that many pastors and worship planners looked ahead to this Sunday and wondered why such a long hymn—one that doesn’t have any immediately obvi ..read more

The Lutheran Chorale of Milwaukee held its annual spring concert yesterday, May 8, 2023 at St. Marcus Lutheran Church in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The concert program featured all American composers, including two songs by the founding director of the Lutheran Chorale, Pastor Kurt Eggert. The Chorale’s current director, Levi Nagel, asked if I would present a short tribute to Kurt Eggert during the concert, since there are a number of Eggert-related anniversaries to note this year. The text of my address follows. I shortened the spoken address from what is printed here for the sake of time, but thi ..read more

At a recent circuit study (small group of pastors gathered for study), one of the other pastors asked me, “Why do we celebrate Good Shepherd Sunday during the Easter season?” Good question! In the three-year lectionary (system of weekly Bible readings used in worship) used by many congregations, the first three Sundays of the Easter season focus on resurrection appearances of Jesus. The events at the empty tomb are the natural highlight in the Easter Sunday Gospel accounts. The Second Sunday of Easter presents the Doubting Thomas account from John 20, which occurred one week after the day Jesu ..read more

Two days ago, I posted an article with a short summary of all of the services Crown of Life offers during Holy Week. That series of services concludes tonight with the Great Vigil of Easter. Although the Easter Vigil is a fairly new concept to congregations in the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod, there are a handful of congregations that now offer a vigil, and often as a “regional vigil” not just for their own members but also for members of neighboring congregations in our fellowship. Just by word of mouth, without investigating further, I know there are vigils taking place this eve ..read more

I have spent the past five days attending the first week of a two-week “summer quarter” class at Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary — specifically Adult Education as Communication with Prof. Mark Paustian from Martin Luther College. No one will ever accuse me of being a morning person, but even this night owl has thoroughly enjoyed arriving at the Seminary for the 7:15 a.m. starting time of what has been an outstanding class. I pray this experience will help me to be a better teacher of adults.   The advantage of being in school is that I have been largely detached from the world and specificall ..read more

About every three years, I include in my church’s Thanksgiving Day service a litany that features several congregational hymn stanzas from familiar, cherished hymns. This litany was first published in Wisconsin Lutheran Quarterly in 1987 (Vol. 84, No. 3, pp. 228-229) and was prepared by Robert Potratz (then principal at Trinity Lutheran School, Neenah, WI) and James Tiefel (then professor at Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary). I used this litany two years ago for our Thanksgiving Day service at Crown of Life and received quite a few appreciative comments — so much so that I thought I should include ..read more

Yesterday, November 21, 2021, Crown of Life Lutheran Church held a special service at which we dedicated Christian Worship: Hymnal as the new hymnal for our congregation. We celebrated this occasion with two other pastors who participated with me in the service: Pastor Emeritus William Schaefer, who is the nephew of the late Pastor Kurt Eggert, project director for the previous WELS hymnal; and Professor Jonathan Micheel from Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary, who served on the Executive Committee of the WELS Hymnal Project and as chairman of its Rites Committee. (Prof. Micheel’s sermon is avai ..read more