# LCMS Convention Workbook_St. Louis Missouri_2019_S378 # Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration) 378 X. REPORT AND RECOMMENDATIONS: 13-03 TASK FORCE assigned to the theological faculties, and in 1580 authority passed to the spiritual heads of the church. Already by 1544, the University of Leipzig insisted that no one be ordained in the ministry who had not studied at a recognized university. Indeed, by the early 1530s Melanchthon had revised the Wittenberg curriculum to ensure that students would be properly formed for Christ’s service. Thus, the assumption of the Lutheran Reformation was a welltrained pastor who was “able to teach.” Able to teach meant that one was not a simple liturgical practitioner or a detached philosopher. Rather, as Dr. John Kleinig has pointed out, for Luther a theologian is created by God and his preparation for the ministerial office involves “the ongoing reception of the Holy Spirit,” who enables His pastor to divide Law and Gospel properly in preaching and to deliver the grace of God to His people through the Sacraments.4 A servant must be formed first in Christ through the Holy Spirit working through Word and Sacrament in order to be formed for Christ’s service to the church and the world. As a result, argues Siedlecki: For Luther, public education was both a civil and a religious responsibility, and as such was directly connected to theological education. Pastors had a preaching, but also a teaching function, as the publication of Luther’s catechisms in 1529 and the proliferation of catechetical literature in Lutheran regions well attests. It is in this regard that Luther and his fellow reformers differ most significantly from Erasmus and other humanists. While Erasmus believed that education was essentially humancentered, and functioning in harmony with faith and Scripture, for Luther it was uncompromisingly God-centered and subordinated to faith.5 Melanchthon built in a means for assessing whether candidates for the ministry were sufficiently formed in and for Christ at the end of their studies. His Examin Eorum provided a long list of questions, roughly following the outline of the Augsburg Confession, for candidates to answer.6 But these were not simply academic exercises; they also had application in preaching and teaching the people. As Melanchthon outlined the purpose of the questions: “Let us consider that the candidates for ordination be diligently examined in all these articles, the review of which shall provide good instruction for the people.” On Doctrine • On the forgiveness of sins, the justification of humans before God through faith by the will of our Lord Christ. • Whether the teaching that we are justified by faith alone is correct. • On the difference between the doctrine of our churches on the matter and the false Catholic teaching. • Whether the Catholic teaching is correct that a man shall continually have doubts whether he has been forgiven and is pleasing to God. On Good Works • Which works should one observe? • How do these [works] please God? • Does sin remain in the saints and repentant while they are still alive? • Which sin repels the Holy Spirit, so that a man falls again under God’s wrath and condemnation, unless he repents? On the Sacraments • On Baptism. • Whether young children should be baptized. • On the Lord’s Supper, what elements should be administered, and why one should receive them. • On the difference between proper use and misuse. • Why the Catholic sacrificial mass, intended to earn the forgiveness of sins, is wrong and to be avoided. • On penance. • On absolution and faith. • On the most significant false Catholic teachings on this article of penance. • What the Christian church is, and by what signs it is recognized. • Why the Christian church has been placed under the cross, and on the consolation of disheartened Christians. • On the difference between Christian doctrine and pagan religion, as well as other sects. • On prayer. • On the eternal nature of God. • On calling on departed saints. • On the three persons within God. • On ceremonies in the church, which are of human order. • On the purification of both natures in Christ, born of a virgin. • On Christian freedom. • • On the difference between Christian prayer and pagan prayer. On the law of Moses, and the differences between the three parts of the law. • On marriage. • On the creation of all human creatures. • On marriage vows. • On the fall of the first humans. • On secular authority. • On sin, original sin, and true saints. • On God’s eternal law, the difference between the 10 Commandments and other Mosaic laws, the Levitical ceremonies and civil laws. 2019 Convention Workbook Again, this exam was used to underscore the necessary application of doctrine first to the candidate’s own spiritual state, in order that they might teach and encourage others in the cultivation and nurture of the faith given the people in their Baptisms.