Martin Luther’s House Postils are Christ-centered devotional sermons which Luther delivered to his family and students. This newly typeset edition contains the complete collection, originally published by Matthias Loy in three volumes.
“Sweet First Fruits is a… story primarily designed to give scope and opportunity for presenting to the Muslim reader the proofs of the Christian faith, the purity and genuineness of our Bible, its attestation by the Koran, and the consequent obligation on Muslims to obey its precepts.
“Formerly the whole Evangelical Lutheran Church was unanimous in the conviction that Luther was the divinely commissioned Reformer of the Church and the herald of divine truth. But now (many) deny him this honor.
“The doctrine of Justification by Faith alone, was the turning point of the Reformation; it was the experience of its necessity and efficacy in the heart of Martin Luther that constituted his best qualification for the work of the Reformation; and as it distinguished the Lutheran Church from the Church of Rome, so it has come to be regarded as the distinguishing mark of separation between Protestantism and Romanism.
“In these godless and worldly times we must earnestly and diligently preach conversion. We must insist on its necessity. We must reason, exhort, convince, beseech, and plead; ‘Turn ye, turn ye; why will ye die?
“Once family devotions were general, now they are rare… Yet the need of spiritual adjustment is ever the same… But how and when? Why not the breakfast table? Surely one or two minutes may be spared.
“The Lutheran Church may justly claim that, in the Common Service, she possesses and uses “the completest embodiment of the Common Service of the Christian Church of all ages”; a Service “which may he tendered to all Christians who use a fixed Order, the Service of the future as it has been of the past” (Preface to the Common Service).
“[Luther] felt that many things were wanting in this extemporaneous explication… But as he was satisfied that the sense and substance of each Psalm were everywhere faithfully given, and that a very important part of the true religion was here copiously handled; he was, under these assurances, the more willing to overlook any thing that might be wanting in the way of greater correctness, and loftier language and expression.
“The Christian Church is in reality as old as the world itself. It has existed ever since the creation of man; for there always have been true believers, who have done God’s will on earth, and who have gone to heaven when they died.
“Jesus was asked by one of his disciples (Luke 11:2), not one of the twelve, but a more recent follower, who had not been present at the first giving of the prayer, ‘Lord, teach us to pray.
“It is one of the most striking, and most valuable characteristics of the Bible, that it is the Book of mankind. It is both designed, and prepared, for all people, and for all classes of people.
Prayers for all different types of situations easily accessible for use as needed. Keep it on your smartphone or laptop.
You might also find True Christianity by John Arndt and Starck’s Daily Handbook useful.
“…the cause of all anti-Semitism springs from the denial of equal rights and citizenship to Jews in pre-Reformation Christianity… this denial was dogmatized into Christian society by the popes… It was revived in France immediately after the collapse of democracy there in June 1940, and was put into effect by the decrees of the ‘Christian’ Petain-Laval regime on October 18, 1940.
“You don’t mind my being absolutely frank, do you?” continued Baxter after a somewhat awkward silence. “It’s years since I spoke to anyone about such things, and I really want to know.
Samuel Laird (1835-1913) “…belonged to a group of stalwart preachers and leaders whose influence could not be confined to a congregation or a city or a synod. Among them were numbered such men as Krauth, Krotel, Mann, Spaeth, the Schaeffers, Schmucker, Seiss, Greenwald, Passavant.
Richard C. H. Lenski (1864-1936) is best known for his insightful and still invaluable series of New Testament Commentaries. He served as Professor of Theology at Capital University and President of the Western District of Joint Synod of Ohio and Editor Die Lutherische Kirchenzeitung.
“…why go to such lengths in defining the concept of inspiration and explaining its various implications? Because the number of men who, especially during the last century, and in the last decades with renewed force, have denied and are denying the truth of the inspiration of the Scriptures, has been on the increase and also because the element of doubt in conservative circles, fostered by the idea that a subjective certainty alone would serve as a defense, has caused some uneasiness.
Hardback edition now available! “…all epistle texts are selections from letters directed to certain definite persons for a certain important spiritual purpose. What the preacher of today does is to place himself and his hearers in the light of some part of one of these imperishable letters, that now once more the original purpose of this part of the letter may be attained.
“Add… the rejection of the sacramental element in the Reformed churches, and their bald worship will be sufficiently accounted for. They do not believe in the real, active presence of the Savior in His Church.
“The design of the Savior is, to show the difference between true and false religion… There is a true and a false worship of God, there are hopes which have, and there are hopes that have not a true foundation, and for us it is all important to know what will sustain us in the hour of need…