# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1850_S135
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

— 135 —

It recommends to the preachers of our association that they supply the
missionaries with important religious writings, since they lack the means to
acquire these for themselves.

C. Joh. Hermann Fick, currently President [*Präses*].
August Crämer, Secretary.
Friedr. Wilh. Barthel, Treasurer.

(NB.) The Synod asks its readers to take the Commission's wishes well to
heart.

Conference Minutes.

Of the minutes of the pastoral conferences submitted to the President
in the course of the past synodical year, some have already been published
in print. Those still on hand were first given to
various committees for a report and then discussed before the
Synod.

The pastoral conference of the St. Louis District proved
very beneficial. It was held at St. Louis from October 12–16,
1849. Seventeen preachers and several of the schoolteachers
were present. Among other things, the conference dealt with the examination
of candidate Reisner (which turned out to their satisfaction), drafted
a letter of comfort to Pastor Kalb and the reply to
the letter from the Evangelical Lutheran missions in East India, judged the
booklet revised by Pastor Schieferdecker, "Useful Remembrance
for the Confirmed (after Hiller)," which it found good and
resolved to recommend for printing to the Synod. It was also resolved that
the pastors should collect examples of God's wonderful working in our
time and hand them, written down, to the Secretary for
safekeeping. Finally, the conference expressed its opinion on Löhe's
aphorisms [*Löheſchen Aphorismen*, Wilhelm Löhe's writings]. —

As for the booklet for the newly confirmed revised by Pastor
Schieferdecker, the Synod resolved that it be sent to press in its
name as soon as possible.

The members of the Michigan Conference had gathered the previous year
from October 1–3 at Frankenmuth. In their minutes
they first state their view on how a preacher can work most
beneficially in public and private pastoral care. They
narrow this broad question first to the right manner of preaching and
hold that the preacher should speak the Word in all simplicity, proclaim
the pure doctrine, rightly divide Law and Gospel, drive neither of the two
exclusively, and apply it correctly according to the hearers' needs. They
set forth the view: "one must entirely cast off concern for the effect of one's
sermon; every success deliberately produced by oneself (Methodism)
is to be regarded as an embezzlement of the divine gifts of grace;
to preach for results means nothing other than taking from the Lord the judgment
that he has reserved for himself; the preacher therefore must pay no
attention at all to the effect of his sermon, but his only
earnest concern must be that he preach God's Word purely and clearly and thereby
save his own soul." — Although the Synod grants that the success
of preaching comes solely from the power of the Word, which is spirit and life,
it by no means considers a calculation of results forbidden;
for it is the preacher's calling to persuade (Acts 18:4, see the