# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1846 05 02_S69
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

The Lutheran.

"God's Word and Luther's teaching shall not pass away, now or ever."

Edited by C. F. W. Walther.

Volume 2.

St. Louis, Mo., May 2, 1846.

No. 18.

Terms: The Lutheran appears once every two weeks, at a subscription price of one dollar for subscribers living away from St. Louis, half of which they must pay in advance, bearing the postage themselves. — In St. Louis single copies are sold for 5 cents each.

On Sneaks and Backstreet Preachers.

(See: Luther's Exposition of Psalm 82.)

I.

The backstreet preachers sneak about, uncalled and unsent, into houses here and there, and spread their poison before the pastor (or the authorities) find out. These are the thieves and murderers of whom Christ speaks in John 10:8, who invade other men's parishes and lay hold of an office not entrusted to them but forbidden them.

A citizen is obligated, when one of these backstreet sneaks comes to him, before he listens to him or lets him teach, to report it to his authorities, and also to the pastor whose parishioner he is. If he fails to do this, he should know that, as a betrayer of his pastor (to whom he owes honor), he acts against God, is himself guilty, and becomes, along with the sneak, a thief and a rogue — just as Psalm 50:16–20 says of such backstreet teachers: God said to the wicked man: What right have you to declare my statutes, or take my covenant in your mouth, seeing you hate instruction and cast my words behind you? When you see a thief (that is, a thief of souls, John 10:8), you consent with him, and you keep company with adulterers (that is, with the superstitious and heretics); you give your mouth to evil, and your tongue frames deceit; you sit and speak against your brother, and slander your own mother's son.

Had Münzer (the head of the Anabaptists), Karlstadt, and their companions not been allowed to sneak and creep into other men's houses and parishes — places to which no one had sent them and for which they had no commission — all that great calamity would surely have been avoided. But that the apostles, too, first went into other men's houses and preached — for that they had a commission; they were appointed, called, and sent for this very purpose, that they should preach in all places,

* We call our readers' attention to this consideration of Luther's, which is exceedingly important also for our own time and especially for our local church circumstances here. One sees from this that the fanatical sects pursue the very same business today as they did centuries ago. One need only compare what Luther says here about the Anabaptists of his day with the doings of the Methodists, of many so-called evangelical preachers, and others in this country. D. H.

as Christ said in Mark 16:15: "Go into all the world and preach to every creature." But after that, no one any longer has that general apostolic commission; rather, each bishop or pastor has his own designated parish or charge, which St. Peter, in 1 Peter 5:3, therefore also calls kleros — that is, a portion — so that to each one his portion of the people is entrusted (as St. Paul also writes to Titus), and in that charge no other or outside person, without his knowledge and consent, should presume to teach his parishioners, whether secretly or publicly; and on pain of body and soul no one should listen to such a person, but should instead report and announce him to his pastor or to the authorities.

And this one should hold firmly: that no preacher, however godly or upright he may be, should presume to preach to or secretly teach the people of a papist or heretical pastor without that same pastor's knowledge and consent. For he has not been commissioned to do so. And what one has not been commissioned to do, one should leave alone. We have enough to do if we wish to carry out what we have been commissioned to do. Nor does it help them to claim that all Christians are priests. It is true that all Christians are priests, but they are not all pastors. For beyond being a Christian and a priest, a man must also have an office and a parish entrusted to him. It is the commission and the call that makes pastors and preachers. Just as a citizen or layman may well be learned, he is not thereby a doctor, so that he might lecture publicly in the schools or take upon himself such an office, unless he is called to it.

This I have had to point out concerning the sneaks and backstabbing preachers, of whom there are now an excessive number, in order to warn all pastors and authorities to watch over this diligently, to admonish their people accordingly, and to charge them to be on guard against such runners and rogues and to avoid them as certain messengers of the devil — unless they bring good testimony and evidence of their call and commission from God for such work in such a parish. Otherwise one should neither admit nor listen to them, even if they wished to preach the pure Gospel itself, yes, even if they were angels and very Gabriels from heaven. For God wills that nothing be done out of one's own choice and devotion, but everything out of commission and calling, especially the office of preaching, as St. Peter says in 2 Peter 1:21: "Know this first, that no prophecy ever came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit."

Therefore Christ himself would not allow the devils to speak, even though they proclaimed him the Son of God and spoke the truth (Luke 4:34–35; Mark 1:24–25), for he would not permit such an example of preaching without a call. So let everyone now consider: if he wishes to preach or teach, let him prove the call and commission that drives and compels him to it, or else keep silent. If he will not, let the authorities hand such a rogue over to the proper master — the one called Master Hans (the hangman); that is then his due, as one who certainly intends to stir up rebellion, or worse, among the people.

II.

(See: Luther's Works, Halle edition, XX, 2074ff. Letter Concerning Sneaks and Backstreet Preachers. Anno 1531.)

I have heard, my dear sir and friend, how among you and around you the Anabaptists also like to come sneaking in and wish to smear our people with their poison. ...

First of all, they can be caught easily and readily by asking them about their vocation (calling) — who bade them come sneaking in, or preach thus in a corner — for they can give no answer, nor show their commission. And I say in truth, even if such sneaks had no other fault whatsoever and were utter saints, this one thing alone — that they come sneaking in without commission and without being asked — is enough to convict them by force as messengers and teachers of the devil. For the Holy Spirit does not sneak, but flies down openly from heaven. Serpents sneak, but doves fly; therefore such sneaking is the devil's true gait — that never fails.

I have heard it said how these sneaks manage to find their way to the workers at harvest time and preach to them in the field during their labor, and likewise to the charcoal-burners and to isolated people in the woods, and