# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1846 09 29_S16
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

chamber door, and went out into the garden to pray for the patient.

After half an hour I went back to him, and as soon as I opened the door, he cried out to me as loudly as he could: "I am damned! I am damned!" One could clearly read fear and terror in his face and gestures.

Because he had come into this state solely through fear of the punishment of hell, it was necessary to repeat what I had first set before him, which in his earlier hardened state had been unable to bear any fruit. I therefore explained to him once again the abominable nature both of his transgression of the fourth commandment and of his whole sinful corruption in general, so that he might be terrified not only at the punishment but at the sin itself. Now there was no longer any trace of his former defiance. He granted me, without excuse, that I was right in everything, and continually condemned himself. I therefore now proclaimed to him the great reconciliation and universal grace in Christ Jesus, and urged him to believe this word — which he now listened to eagerly. He developed an intense longing for the forgiveness of sins; yet it cost him a great struggle to believe it firmly as well. He begged his mother, mournfully and with many tears, for forgiveness, as well as her betrothed, whom he now came to love dearly; he also asked my forgiveness, and when I spoke a humble prayer of repentance for him, he prayed it after me with real fervor, so that from every sign one could perceive a great change in his heart.

Now the mother too thanked me for having carried out my office toward her son. I had to forbid her, however, from speaking much with him about the state of his soul. Instead, I asked her betrothed to stay with him through the night, and instructed him what he should speak and pray with him, and so I left him for this time.

When I came again the following morning, I heard that he had spent most of the night in prayer, and that he had repeatedly shown true repentance over his sins; also that he had become joyful in faith in Christ, and would not let his mother's betrothed (whom he had previously been quite unable to bear) leave his bedside. I found him fairly calm, and after a brief examination I recognized the marks that his faith was alive. When I now reminded him again of some of his former sins, in order to deepen his poverty of spirit, his heart melted like wax before fire. But when I spread out my words about the redemption of Jesus Christ, about his infinite grace and kindness, and how he had forgiven him his grievous sins as well, and how he would soon, very soon, take him up into heaven, he became exceedingly joyful, and declared that he was firmly assured of the forgiveness of his sins, and that he felt the seal of it living in his heart. His face, formerly defiant, was thereby transformed into a devout kindliness, and one could, so to speak, read the blessed state he now found himself in from his very features. I gave him the Holy Supper, and he testified that partaking of the body and blood of his Savior had greatly refreshed him, and that he now awaited his death with comfort. A few storms of temptation did still arise, but the power of the gospel that was held before him repeatedly overcame the rising doubts, so that after a few hours he departed gently and blessedly in his Savior.

"Blessed be the glory of the LORD from his place." Ezekiel 3:12.

The Reckless Abandonment of Congregations by Pastors.

In our time, and especially in this our new fatherland, where not only do the Methodists, for easily explainable reasons, generally leave their preachers with a congregation for only one year, but where many preachers who call themselves Lutheran will scarcely stay with any congregation at all, and at the first sign of any friction arising in the congregation run off like true hirelings and seek out some other, quieter little spot for themselves — it will certainly be good to recall how our godly fathers thought about this matter. They did indeed testify earnestly against a congregation's wanting to hire its pastor for only a year, or otherwise to keep and dismiss him at its own whim; but they testified just as earnestly against a pastor's wanting to take on and abandon congregations as he pleased. Among the many witnesses we could cite on this point, let us first give the floor to the old, honest-hearted Mathesius. This theologian was born in 1504 at Rochlitz in Saxony; at Joachimsthal in Bohemia, on the Saxon border, he was called first as schoolmaster, then as deacon, and finally as town pastor there. He declined several calls that he received from other places. This Mathesius writes as follows in his "History of Jesus Christ," Part II, folio 39:

"That the Lord Christ on the cross commends his precious mother to St. John — from this all Christian pastors and shepherds of souls should learn that Christ himself, through the Holy Spirit and through orderly election and call, commends to them his congregation and little flock, and that they should cherish it faithfully all their life long, as a child cherishes its mother, or as a father his own bodily children, or as a godly man his honest, wedded wife; and when they have faithfully and wisely presided over their churches their whole life long, they should see to it that, alongside this, they raise up and train men to whom, on their deathbed, they can in turn commend Christ's little sheep and lambs.

This is a most necessary teaching for all pastors and bishops. For although one may have ten thousand tutors in Christ, as St. Paul speaks of the preachers of his time, 1 Corinthians 4:15, yet there are few fathers who devote themselves to their church faithfully, wholeheartedly, and in earnest, or who intend to remain and hold out with it. There are many hirelings, hagglers, and peddlers in the world, but few faithful shepherds and honest tradesmen. For the greater part seek their own interest, and few seek what is Christ's. Many a one acts like the sun-peddler, the huckster: where the sun shines, and where he thinks he can turn a profit, there he unpacks his knapsack; but let a dark little cloud roll in, and should his wares fetch a better price at some other church-fair, then he packs up again and moves on — let mother and bride, on whom the Son of God has spent so much, remain wherever she likes, for all he cares.

Therefore all Christian pastors should learn this: if God entrusts a church to a man, he should keep it his whole life long, as his wedded wife, so long as she hears God's Word and is willing to keep her marriage-vow to Christ. For when a congregation kicks over the traces and takes up false doctrine, and itself runs away from its pastor, and pursues and drives him out, then Christ himself bids his servant depart and shake the dust from his feet."*)

After that, the hearers too should learn this: when God sends them faithful teachers who proclaim God's grace to them faithfully and in fatherly fashion, they in turn should show them motherly faithfulness, and follow them obediently, holding them worthy of double honor, 1 Timothy 5:17, so that they may attend to their office not with sighing but with joy. Hebrews 13:17. A pastor who continually changes and switches parishes like a horse-trader does not know what punishment awaits him. Just so, it is likewise not good for the churches when they cast off their teachers (as one dismisses a concubine), or treat them so unfairly that they are forced to move their feet elsewhere.

Truly, such conduct punishes itself. For whoever cannot bear a faithful teacher must afterward have a wolf and a hireling instead,

*) There can, of course, also be other reasons why a pastor may be bound in conscience to accept a new call and to leave his first congregation. J. Gerhard writes on this: "With regard to the transfer of church ministers, some err by conceding too little, others by conceding too much. Too little, in that some think it altogether unlawful for a church minister to be transferred from one place to another; too much, in that they change their offices thoughtlessly, out of frivolity, without pressing need and without any evident benefit to the church — indeed, treating their congregations, after the manner of horse-traders and money-changers, like horses or coins. But just as one may rightly counter the excessive scrupulousness of the former by pointing out that the Lord of the harvest has the power to call his servants, and likewise to transfer them from one congregation to another, and that a congregation of the Lord, as mistress of the house, has that same authority — so too the frivolity of the latter must be countered with the fact that such changes, when they do not occur for weighty reasons, can easily give rise to offense in the church. Everything must be done in proper order — not according to one's own presumption, not according to the private judgment of the individual, not out of ambition, love of power, or prejudice, not out of a desire for a more agreeable position, a greater income, and so forth — but everything must be weighed according to the benefit, the need, and the edification of the congregation." (Loc. theol., De minist., § 171.)