Posted on by Kurt Bodling

Spring[er] Fever

From a modern English translation of lines 1-14 of the General Prologue of Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales”:

When April with his showers sweet with fruit
The drought of March has pierced unto the root
And bathed each vein with liquor that has power
To generate therein and sire the flower;
When Zephyr also has, with his sweet breath,
Quickened again, in every holt and heath,
The tender shoots and buds, and the young sun
Into the Ram one half his course has run,
And many little birds make melody
That sleep through all the night with open eye
(So Nature pricks them on to ramp and rage)-
Then do folk long to go on pilgrimage,
And palmers to go seeking out strange strands,
To distant shrines well known in sundry lands.

An Appalachian Trail hike isn’t a pilgrimage, not in the sense Chaucer was waiting about, and not in the sense of the Camino . But it can be a spiritual experience. There’s lots of time for prayer, silence, and solitude. There’s time and opportunity for growth.

And a lot of people start their hikes in April. I started on 30 March, and there were already over 2,115 people who has started before me. That’s more than twice as many who has started by this time last year.

I’m trying to be ready for engagement as well as solitude.

Posted on by Kurt Bodling

The source of the wise men’s wisdom

Now that Christmas is over, here’s something for Epiphany:

“These magi were carefully prevented from finding Christ by their own efforts or with the aid of men. They found him solely because of the prophet, written word, and the star that shone from heaven, in order that all natural knowledge and human reason might be rejected and every enlightenment repudiated except that which comes through the Spirit and grace. For human reason boasts and claims arrogantly to teach truth and show the proper way, just as the blind men in the universities, of whom we spoke earlier, at present claim to be able to do. Here is determined for all time that Christ, who is the truth that brings salvation, will not permit himself to be taught or found through the teachings or aid of men. The Scriptures alone and the light of God must show him.”

Martin Luther. “The Gospel for the Festival of the Epiphany, Matthew 2” Luther’s Works, American edition, vol. 52. (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1974), page 194.

Posted on by Kurt Bodling

Blessed Christmas

“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” St. John 1:14

I was at a Christmas service once where the lay reader choked up at the phrase “became flesh” in this Gospel. I’ll always remember that, and I’ll think ‘You know what? She was right to get overwhelmed by that.’

Posted on by Kurt Bodling

prophecy and Christmas

“The entire Old Testament contains nothing but Christ as he is preached in the gospel. Therefore we see how the apostles adduce testimony from the Bible and how in this manner they prove everything that is to be preached and to be believed concerning Christ. … Thus we see that the law and the prophets, too, cannot be preached or recognized properly, unless we see Christ wrapped up in the Scriptures.”

Martin Luther. ‘The Gospel for Christmas Eve’ from the Christmas Postil. Luther’s Works, American Edition, vol. 52. (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1974), p. 21-22.

Posted on by Kurt Bodling

the valuable nugget

“In the church nothing other than the gospel shall be preached. … See there what the gospel is: a joyous sermon concerning Christ, our Savior. He who preaches him properly, preaches the gospel and nothing but joy. What greater joy may a heart know than that Christ is given him as his very own? … If there were something else to preach, then the evangelical angel and angelic evangelist would have touched on it.”

Martin Luther. ‘The Gospel for Christmas Eve’ from the Christmas Postil. Luther’s Works, American Edition, vol. 52. (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1974), p. 18, 20-21.

Posted on by Kurt Bodling

first things first

God has commanded “that if you see that your neighbor errs, sins, is in need, and suffers in his body, possessions, or soul, then and there you should get busy, let everything else go, and help him with all you are and have. When you can do no more, then you should help him with words and with prayer.”

Martin Luther. ‘The Gospel for Christmas Eve’ from the Christmas Postil. Luther’s Works, American Edition, vol. 52. (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1974), p. 17.

Posted on by Kurt Bodling

this makes the cake

“He loves, and we believe, and those are the ingredients of the cake. Again, our neighbor believes and is expecting our love. We, then, should love him, too, and not let him look and wait for us in vain. The one is the same as the other: Christ helps us, so we help our neighbor, and all are satisfied.”

Martin Luther. ‘The Gospel for Christmas Eve’ from the Christmas Postil. Luther’s Works, American Edition, vol. 52. (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1974), p. 17.

Posted on by Kurt Bodling

Luther on the aim of good works

“Christ was obedient to his father in this, that he lived and served us. Because you are full and rich, you have no other commandment according to which you serve and obey Christ, except that you direct all your works so that they are good and useful to your neighbor, exactly as Christ’s works are good and useful to you … The purpose is that we, in turn, do likewise, not to him — he is not in need of it — but to our neighbor.”

Martin Luther. ‘The Gospel for Christmas Eve’ from the Christmas Postil. Luther’s Works, American Edition, vol. 52. (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1974), p. 16-17.

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Christians and the Blessed Virgin

“See to it that you make his birth your own, and that you make an exchange with him, so that you rid yourself of your birth and receive, instead, his. This happens, if you have this faith. By this token you sit assuredly in the Virgin Mary’s lap and are her dear child. This faith you have to practice and to pray for as long as you live; you can ever strengthen it enough. That is our foundation and our inheritance; on it the good works are to be built.”

Martin Luther. ‘The Gospel for Christmas Eve’ from the Christmas Postil. Luther’s Works, American Edition, vol. 52. (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1974), p. 16.

Posted on by Kurt Bodling

Christ’s birth and our birth

“Christ willed to be born so that we might be born in a different manner, as he says in John 3:3-6. This happens through faith, as James 1:18 says: ‘He has born us of his own will through his word of truth, so that we begin to be his new creation.’ In this manner Christ takes to himself our birth and absorbs it in his birth; he presents us with his birth so that we become pure and new in it, as if it were our own, so that every Christian might rejoice in this birth of Christ and glory in it no less than if he, too, like Christ, had been born bodily of Mary. Whoever does not believe this or has doubts about it, is not a Christian.”

Martin Luther. ‘The Gospel for Christmas Eve’ from the Christmas Postil. Luther’s Works, American Edition, vol. 52. (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1974), p. 15.