# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1965_S10
# Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

10 PRESIDENT’S ADDRESS

other Christians, the other Lutherans, through whom
He is also at work. As God gives us opportunity, we
will testify. As God provides opportunity to study the-
ology together, we will do so. And if His opportunities
take us beyond the framework of Protestantism, we will
share God’s grace and a firm testimony to those who are
neither Protestant nor Lutheran. The Reformation had
something significant to say in its day, and it has some-
thing to say to us and to Christians of the Roman per-
suasion also now. And if God gives us the grace to reach
unity of doctrine, faith, and confession, then we can be
sure that Christ’s prayer and our prayer for the one-
ness of the church have been answered.

When Jesus comes again, the church should be about
His business and her business. As God’s children in this
world we are deeply concerned about issues like civil
disobedience. As the church we are more concerned
about disobedience to God. As Christians we deplore
discrimination of every kind against a fellowman. Our
greatest concern, however, is that no discrimination dare
ever permit anyone from having and holding all the
privileges Christ has earned for him. As Christians we
seek equality of opportunity for all men created by God.
The greatest of all opportunities, though, must be the
opportunity for men of every class and race and nation
to hear and share in God’s grace.

When Jesus comes again, we know already now what
will happen in that glorious moment. Until that time

we should have a foundation on which we can stand
and a platform from which we can move:

1. Let us affirm our trust in God’s infallible Word
and commit ourselves to more faithful study and use of
this Word.

2. Let us confess our failings as His people and
implore the forgiveness He has assured us in Christ
Jesus.

3. Let us pledge ourselves to strive to preserve the
unity of faith in the bond of peace with every brother
in our synodical fellowship.

4, Let us promise that we will endeavor to seek to
establish and to manifest the unity we have in Christ
Jesus with every other brother of God’s household.

5. Let us surrender ourselves and all we have to the
full and unending proclamation of God’s good Gospel.

6. Let us seek to extend Christ’s compassion and
healing to all those who suffer from the consequences of
their own sin or of the sins of human society.

7. Let us commend to God’s providence and grace
both the church and the world which He created and
redeemed by Jesus Christ.

In confidence we pray with the psalmist: “Let the
beauty of the Lord our God be upon us.” May He estab-
lish the work of our hands upon us; yea, the work of
our hands, may He establish it. Amen.