Acknowledgements

I must, as is proper, give credit where credit is due.

This site wouldn’t be what it is without the congregations where I have served and the opportunities they provided me to wrestle with God and listen for God’s word and for the feedback and experience I gained from them. The fruits of this work are what populate these posts. These congregations are:

• Shepherd of the Hills Lutheran Church, Swift Falls, MN. 2012-present
• Our Redeemer’s Lutheran Church, Benson, MN. 2012-present
• Evangelical Lutheran Church, Mt. Horeb, WI. 2011
• Trinity Lutheran Church, Pottsville, PA. 2008-2009

Thanks as well to Emmanuel Lutheran Church, Moscow ID; Messiah Lutheran Church, Vancover, WA; and St. Thomas Lutheran Church, St. Thomas, PA who each had a hand in forming me both personally and pastorally, and who taught me about what it means to be Church.

And a special thanks to my home congregation: Redeemer Lutheran Church, Great Falls, MT. You formed me, gave me the drive to do what I am doing, and lived up to the promise you made to me at my baptism to place in my hands the Holy Scriptures, teach me the Creed and the Ten Commandments, and to form me in faith. To you all, I am eternally grateful.

A great deal of thanks is due also to my family for their support and the promises they made to me at my baptism, to the faculty at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg for the wonderful exegetical and homiletical training they gave me and the many sermons I heard there, and to my wife Stephanie for pushing me theologically and just being wonderful.

And finally, as much as I might put into these sermons, they are nothing with the Word of God. I can’t recount how many times writers block or a mediocre sermon has been transformed into something useful and fantastic by the grace of God.

+Soli Deo Gloria+