# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_November 1856_S331
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

How are truly Lutheran congregations founded and raised up? 331

...is especially ordained and commanded, and it is just as much in accord with the love of Christ as with holiness, which is the ornament of the house of God, that is, of His congregation.

Naturally this is not the place to expand further on the origin, the nature, the realization, and the purpose of this church discipline; rather, only the proof shall be furnished of how it is necessary and salutary for the blessed continuance and thriving of an evangelical-Christian, that is, Lutheran, congregation. It is said here not without reason: for its continuance; for nothing is required for the coming-into-being of such a congregation but the preaching of the divine Word, that is, of the Gospel, and the administration of Baptism, among those who receive this Word in faith and willingness; and among newly arising congregations a considerable time may, under certain circumstances, elapse before the congregation has grown strong enough, partly in the knowledge of this article of doctrine, and partly has submitted itself far enough to the discipline of the divine Word, to carry out, according to the direction of Christ, the complete church discipline even to the utmost exercise of the power of the binding key, that is, to exclusion from the congregation, to the ban, in the fear of the Lord and in obedience to His Word. For it would be done very unwisely and be directly contrary to the evangelical, that is, Lutheran spirit, if a pastor, in congregations just newly formed, weak in knowledge and unrefined, whose members in Germany had been wholly unaccustomed to church discipline, were to attempt at once, after brief prior instruction, to introduce the same in strict conformity of form; for not a few, especially among the younger, zealous Lutheran pastors, are of the opinion that only there is a rightly believing Christian congregation where church discipline is in vigorous practice and use — indeed, that it too is an essential mark and characteristic of the Church of Christ. But this is erroneous; for such marks can only be the true means of grace, the pure Word and Sacrament, through which the Church, as the congregation of believers, comes into being, and without which it cannot possibly exist; where, then, the Word of God is taught purely and clearly and the Sacraments are administered according to the Gospel, there is, as our Confession declares, also the Church of Christ, the congregation of the saints. Only what essentially and permanently constitutes the Church can also be an essential and permanent mark of the Church, and according to Isaiah 55:10-11 we indeed also have the promise that where the means of grace are in active use, children of God, be they many or few, are in any case born to the Lord, like the dew from the dawn.

It is therefore by no means in keeping with the evangelical wisdom of the Lutheran Church, but is rather a mark of an immature and unwise zeal akin to the legalistic, driving spirit of the Reformed, when, especially, younger Lutheran pastors, upon entering the service of congregations either newly arisen or older but neglected through the mechanical ministrations of hirelings and belly-servants, still weak...