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“The Sacrament of Holy Baptism: How Can Water Do Such Great Things?” Today we continue our series on the six chief parts of the catechism, and we come to the Sacrament of Holy Baptism. And the catechism has some pretty impressive things to say about Baptism: “It works forgiveness of sins, rescues from death and the devil, and gives eternal salvation to all who believe this.” “Wow! That’s quite a list! And you’re telling me that Baptism does all of that? That Baptism actually works? That it accomplishes such marvelous things? You’re kidding me, right? Just pouring some water over...

“The Cleansing of Naaman: How Can Water Do Such Great Things?” (2 Kings 5:1-14)Our text is the Old Testament Reading for today, the story of the cleansing of Naaman. Short version: Naaman was a man who had leprosy. He was told, “Wash, and be clean.” And, after some objections, Naaman did wash, and he did become clean. But there’s more here than meets the eye, as we will see. For one thing, this story raises the question: How could simply washing in a river--and a pretty unimpressive river, at that--how could that cleanse a man of leprosy? And what does...

....One last point before we bullet point the complete idea behind the Holy and Rightful judgement from the Judge of all mankind. there were 42 persons killed by two bears. Obviously this would require many more than 42 people. Why? What happens when you have a group of ten people and a bear comes crashing out of the bushes in preparation to attack? Every one will immediately scatter! In the debate I pointed out that freezing 42 people and allowing the bears time to go down the line to kill each one would be even more of a miracle than...