# LCMS Convention Workbook_St. Louis Missouri_2013_S206
# Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

206

Theology and Church Relations
106. John 6:63.
107. Luther’s Works, American Edition, vol. 22, p. 12.
108. Jeremiah 1:9–10; Romans 10:17.
109. John 15:3.
110. John 6:27.

83. 2 Samuel: 2:11
84. Matt. 7:15; Romans 16:17; 2 Cor. 6:14–18; Gal. 5:9; 2 John 10:11.
85. 1 Peter 2:9.
86. Acts 17:26.
87. 2 John 9–10; Titus 3:10–11; Romans 16:17; Otten. op. cit., 69.
88. The LCMS says in its Brief Statement (CNE, appendix vols. 1 and
2):
28. On Church-fellowship—since God ordained that His
Word only without the admixture of human doctrine, be taught
and believed in the Christian Church, 1 Pet. 4:11; John 8:31–32;
1 Tim. 6:3–4. All Christians are required by God to discriminate between orthodox and heterodox church bodies. Matt. 7:15, to have
church-fellowship only with orthodox church bodies, and, in case they
have strayed into heterodox church bodies, to leave them, Rom. 16:17.
We repudiate unionism, that is, church fellowship with the adherents of
false doctrine, as disobedience to God’s command, as causing divisions
in the Church, Rom. 16:17; 2 John 9:10, and as involving the constant
danger of losing the Word of God entirely, 2 Tim. 2:17–21.
29. The orthodox character of a church is established not by its mere
name nor by its outward acceptance of, and subscription to, an orthodox creed, but by the doctrine which is actually taught in its pulpits, in
its theological seminaries, and in its publications. On the other hand, a
church does not forfeit its orthodox character through the casual intrusion of errors, provided these are combated and eventually removed by
means of doctrinal discipline. Acts 20:30; 1 Tim. 1:3.

2013 Convention Workbook

Dr. C. F. W. Walther, first President of the LCMS, said at the first
convention of the Synod’s Iowa District in 1873:
As soon as we look more to our Synod than to the invisible kingdom
of God, the kingdom of grace and salvation, we begin to be a sect. For
this is reality the essence of sectarianism that one has his eye on his
little fellowship above all, even though the kingdom of God may suffer harm thereby. That preacher is no true preacher who merely seeks
to fanaticize his congregation for the Lutheran Church, or for the Missouri Synod, or, worse still, only for the Iowa District. Such men are
bad preachers. They must rather direct people to Christ and say: See,
we preach the pure Word of God, in which the everlasting Gospel of
Christ is continued; that is why you should adhere to us, and therefore
we say, leave us as soon as we no longer do this! For salvation by no
means depends on us, nor also on the Missouri Synod. So if it no longer
preaches the pure Word of God, then it is worthy of nothing but that one
forsake it.

Trinity
New Haven, MO