# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_M rz 1856_S84
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

84

(Submitted by A. B.)
A Free Conference.

Since it would seem expedient, in order to bring the idea of a free conference of orthodox Lutherans to maturity, if as many voices as possible were heard on the matter, whether for it or against it, I hasten to make the beginning, in the hope of soon finding many followers who will treat the subject more thoroughly and comprehensively than I am able to do.

It was a joyful surprise to me to find, in the preface to the second volume of „Lehre und Wehre,“ a thought stirred up that has already lived in me for some years, and to which I have also sought to procure sympathy in narrower and wider circles.

Whoever has followed the history of the Lutheran Church in the United States over the last decade will have to confess, to the praise of God, that a transformation has begun that justifies the most joyful prospects for the future. Great masses of orthodox writings have been put into circulation during this time; the Book of Concord has become common property for thousands of Lutherans, not only in the German but now also in the English language. The divine seed thus scattered abroad

cannot possibly have remained without fruit, as indeed many facts seal the truth of the divine promise, Isaiah 55:10-11. Several synods confess themselves, expressly and without reservation, with greater or lesser decisiveness and fidelity, to the confessional writings of the Lutheran Church. The number of men who know how to value the noble jewel of a pure doctrine grows from year to year, and even in the very midst of the synods that have departed furthest from Lutheran doctrine, voices are becoming ever louder — now more boldly, now more timidly — urging a return to unadulterated Lutheranism. These are causes for joy, which we ought not let be diminished by our perception of so many, alas still persisting, distressing phenomena.

Nevertheless, complete unity is at present lacking; in part, no small difference of conviction may show itself among the friends of the symbolical books in their understanding of the doctrines laid down in them; in part, the friends of the symbolical books still stand so far apart from one another, for the most part do not even know one another personally, and are perhaps still possessed of various prejudices against one another, well-founded or groundless. Enough has been written up to now, but little has been spoken. I know of no more suitable means, both to foster unity of spirit among the like-minded and to procure for the Lutheran confession an ever more general recognition in wider circles, than a free conference; and although I do not venture to attach to it the hope of a unified American-Lutheran church, as which