# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1860_S24
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

— 24 —

...fail to come. It was especially important and gratifying for me to
note that catechism instruction in church was, in many places, being
carried on well, and was also, on the whole, well attended. Several of
the brothers combined catechism sermons with the examination. In some
places the examination repeatedly ran into local difficulties. With
some, admittedly, there is still cause to lament the laziness of the
congregation, and, just as much, the discouragement of the preacher.
For all, I wish to repeat the remark from my previous report: "If we
want to have congregations that are rightly grounded in knowledge,
then, following the example of Luther and of the Lutheran Church in
general in its flourishing period, the catechism must be taught with
real earnestness and careful diligence, amid pleading and sighing to
Him who gives the increase."

To give frequent reports on the condition of the congregations has
its own difficulty. The good grows slowly, the best quite properly in
secret; evil, to be sure, grows faster, but breaks out into the open
just as little at once — especially where a godly discipline as a whole
pervades the congregations. Still, one must say, on the whole, to the
Lord's praise, that participation in congregational and synodical
affairs, as well as discipline and order in general, is increasing,
although there certainly remains much still to be desired and worked
at. At the same time, however, the fear must also be voiced that, on
the other hand, a worldly mind and a yielding to the material bustle of
this country — or should I say, of this age in general — threatens here
and there to gain more ground in the congregations the more prosperity
increases as a whole, and the more the prospect of getting ahead in
worldly things opens up. May the Lord grant us all true watchfulness
and caution, and make especially us preachers ever more skilled, through
earnest, loving warning and exhortation, as well as through the
commending of the eternal heavenly treasures that have been won for us
in Christ Jesus and given to faith through the Gospel, to check this
danger. A worldly mind can already have gained the upper hand even
where everything outwardly still goes its accustomed way under the
cover of ordinary discipline and order. That the abuse of Christian
freedom on the one side often provokes a false legalistic strictness on
the other is only natural, and this calls for heightened wisdom and
caution, in office and in conduct, among preachers and among all for
whom godliness is a serious matter. It is not easy to sail between
these reefs without danger.

As for the order of worship, things still look, on the whole, just
as deficient as before. Now, we certainly know — provided, as is the
case with us, that only orthodox Agenda [liturgical service-books] are
in use — that this is not an essential matter; but it is nevertheless
to be regretted that such a motley confusion still occurs among us.
Precisely because the liturgy is in itself a matter of indifference
[Mitteldinge/adiaphoron], while the doctrine of Christian freedom,
thank God, prevails everywhere among us, and this freedom itself
remains well preserved in all congregations, the congregations should
all the more agree upon a uniform liturgy, so as to let the unity of
spirit come outwardly to expression as well. It is astonishing with
what tenacity the greatest tastelessness is often clung to in this
respect. God mend it.

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