Lutheran Essentials meets in the undercroft of the church on Wednesday evenings at 7pm. You can reach the undercroft by going around to the back parking lot of the church and descending the staircase to the kitchen. Knock on the door if it is closed and some one will let you in. Our current study is on the Canon of Scripture. The book we are using is F. F. Bruce’s “The Canon of Scripture”. If you do not have a copy we are providing them for free. We are also continuing to provide the Book of Concord for free.
The Psalm for this session is Psalm 10. The Small Catechism lesson is the Third Commandment.
This week we will continue our study on the New Testament canon with the ninth chapter The New Testament: Marcion. We will finish this chapter by reading The So-Called Marcionite Prologues (pg. 141-144) and talk about the prefaces that the arch-heretic Marcion wrote for his collection. We will finish this chapter by clearing our mind of heresy of docetism and sing the hymn “Savior of the Nations, Come” (LSB 332).
We will then move forward and talk about another thrice damned heretic in the tenth chapter The New Testament: Valentinus and His School. We will read the first section Valentinus and the New Testament (pg. 145-146) and learn about the gnostic heretic Valentinus. In the second section Valentinian Literature (pg. 146-148) we will discuss what books Valentinus held as inspired. We will finish by reading about the heretic Ptolemy (pg. 148-149) and his view on the New Testament writings. To purge the heresy of gnosticism for our minds we will sing the hymn “O Love, How Deep” (LSB 544)
If we have time we will move on to read the eleventh chapter The New Testament: The Catholic Response. We will first read the section on A Catholic Collection (pg. 150-154) and discuss how the catholic, orthodox church dealt with the challenges to Scripture brought by Marcion and Valentinus, and the rule of faith. We will also read the section on The So-Called Anti-Marcionite Prologues (pg. 154-157) which are prefaces written by some in the catholic, orthodox church to combat Marcion.
As always new people are always welcome to this study at any point during the class. Please talk to the Pastor, Elders or Paul Edmon if you have any questions.
