Advent Decreasing that Christmas may Increase
Advent is here, and Christmas is approaching. It’s very easy for us to overlook Advent because of Christmas. This is a bit unfortunate…
Author: Pastor Andrew Preus
Pastor Andrew Preus is the pastor of Trinity Lutheran/St. Paul Lutheran, Guttenberg/McGregor, IA. He is the eighth of eleven sons, with one sister. He received his seminary training at Concordia Lutheran Theological Seminary, St. Catharines, ON (MDiv) from 2009 to 2013, and Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, IN (STM) from 2013 to 2014. His main theological interests include Justification and Church and Ministry. He is married to Leah Preus (nee Fehr), and they have five children: Jacob, Solveig, Kristiana, Robert, and Marian.
Remembering My Grandpa on his Birthday
Twenty years ago today my grandpa Preus celebrated his seventy first birthday, the last birthday he would celebrate before he died nineteen days later….
Learning to Pray from the Imprecatory Psalms
We can learn a lot from the imprecatory psalms. These are the psalms that speak godly judgment on the ungodliness of…
Christian Worship: Palm Sunday Sermon
What is worship? How do you worship? Well, the word worship literally means to ascribe worth to someone or something. And this is…
Update on St. Timothy Lutheran Church UK
The following is an update of St. Timothy Lutheran Church in Sunderland, England, which was vandalized and burned back in January: We have…
Confessional Lutheran Parish Suffers Vandalism and Arson
Dear BJS readers, The following is found here, where you can give what you are able to help this congregation that serves as a…
First Sermon on the Magnificat — Let It Be To Me According To Your Word
I am doing my sermon series for midweek Advent Services on the Magnificat. The first week’s readings are 1 Samuel 1:1-20 and Luke…
Market-Style Evangelism is Enthusiasm
A fellow author for BJS, Pastor Joe Abrahamson, brought to my attention this testimonial of a woman who apostatized after realizing that her…
Believing and Confessing the Forgiveness of Sins: Sermon on Matthew 18:21-35
True unity is found only in pure doctrine. This is because the center of all Christian doctrine is the death of Christ for…
Hymn on the Carmen Christi
The Carmen Christi (Song of Christ) is a song (or hymn) that St. Paul, under inspiration of the Holy Spirit, wrote in the…
Some Thoughts on the Doctrine of Vocation
Since the word “vocation” is thrown around so much, I have been trying to work out in my mind and through study of…
Some Clarifications in Articulating Objective Justification
First, Objective Justification and Subjective Justification are not two different justifications, but rather two parts of the act of Justification. My brother…
Just a Quote from Hunnius
In arguing against the Huberian error that because Christ has redeemed all men he therefore elected all men, Hunnius maintains: But we respond…
My 3 Reasons to Read Melanchthon’s Common Places 1521, a New Translation
Philip Melanchthon, Common Places: Loci Communes 1521, trans. Christian Preus (St. Louis:CPH, 2014). I have three reasons why our readers should purchase and…
The Comfort of Forensic Justification
Forensic justification is that God makes us righteous by crediting to us the righteousness of Jesus. He doesn’t make us righteous through a…
Sanctify Them by the Truth – Hallowed be Thy Name: Prayers for Doctrine and Practice
“These are Your Words, Heavenly Father. Sanctify us by the Truth. Your Word is Truth. Amen.” I cannot count how many times I…
Seek and You will Find: Meditation for Holy Week
O Sinner, come thy sin to mourn So vast and vile that it has borne Christ to this vale of anguish. Son of…
Why Doctrine is our Life
In previous articles I have stressed the centrality of justification in Christian doctrine and thus the eminent relevance of doctrine to the people…
Our Creator Redeems His Creation: John 2:1-11
Jesus blesses and sanctifies marriage. He does this in two ways. First He creates it, and then He redeems it. Jesus created marriage when…
Why God’s Doctrine is for God’s People
What happens when Justification becomes peripheral and not the central article? I’ll tell you what happens: Doctrine becomes not life. Doctrine becomes something…
Observations of Holbein’s Analogy of the Old and New Testament
The students of Concordia Lutheran Theological Seminary, St. Catharines, ON started a student journal last year, which is called Propter Christum. This year,…
A Divine Vocation: Motherhood
I started writing this post about a month ago, and I stopped writing and almost forgot about it. But yesterday I read from…
Christ’s Forensic Suffering and Our Forensic Justification: Some thoughts on the Creed
This past weekend, I taught on the 2nd Article of the Creed at a confirmation retreat. In preparation, I was given a nifty…
My First Sermon as a Vicar: Our Condescending God and Lord
Text: Mark 9:30-37 Our Condescending God and Lord Dear friends in Christ, When someone is condescending, we usually understand that to mean that…
Objective Justification: Affirming Sola Fide
One thing I have noticed about the opponents of Objective Justification is that they tend to say that we who hold to it…