# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_Mai 1855_S158
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

158 Extracts as Contributions to Pastoral Casuistry.

should admonish him. In Matthew 18, the Lord Jesus Christ therefore prescribes a special rule: one should first admonish a sinful person alone, then with one or two others, and seek to win him back from his fall. The holy apostle Paul also writes in Galatians 6: If a person should be overtaken by some fault, then you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. To instruct us in this all the more, the Holy Spirit has recorded in Holy Scripture clear examples of it, which confirm this divine will and the preacher’s duty. First of all, it is well known from Luke 22 what Christ, the only-begotten Son of God Himself, did for Peter alone in the midst of His greatest torment: He set aside all His own suffering, turned toward this fallen sinner, looked upon him most movingly, and won him back to repentance. He did likewise for unbelieving Thomas after His victorious resurrection, John 20, when He did not consider it too much, for Thomas’s sake, to appear once more especially in the assembly of the disciples and to show him alone the marks of His wounds and nails. Therefore, in Luke 15, in order to leave His disciples and all their successors in the preaching ministry a clear example, He compares Himself to such a faithful shepherd, who follows even one single little sheep into the wilderness and searches for it until he finds it.

Thus we read in 2 Samuel 12 of Nathan the prophet that, at God’s command, he went after David alone and diligently sought to bring him out of his sins. Likewise, in Acts 20 Paul speaks of his diligence and says: Remember that for three years I did not cease, day and night, to admonish each one with tears.

What is written here is written for the instruction and imitation of all who serve in the holy preaching ministry, Romans 5:10, so that they likewise should not allow even one sinner whom they know and know about to remain in error and perish, but should do everything in their power, with the greatest and utmost diligence, so that he may be saved. Preachers are ambassadors in Christ’s stead, 2 Corinthians 5, so that His name may be glorified chiefly through their ministry, 2 Thessalonians 1. How, then, can it be otherwise than that they watch over every soul with the greatest diligence and utmost care and pursue it with everything in their power, since the Lord Christ did so much for the sake of one single soul—and especially for the sake of that soul which is now in question, or which might come into question in the future, at whatever time and in whatever place—and purchased it at so great a price; indeed, He did as much for that one soul and purchased it at as great a price as He did for all the souls of the entire human race and as dearly as He purchased them.

Moreover, the preacher knows that God has appointed him both for every individual person in his congregation and for the whole church, and therefore this fallen person belongs under his care, supervision, and pastoral care not only as one among the great multitude, but also individually and especially, and that therefore his