# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1860_S43
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

— Page 43 —

must one not then also claim that the preaching of the Gospel is
merely an announcement of absolution?

To this the following answer was given: One does not say: We
will be redeemed and reconciled a second time, but rather what has
happened once is made our own. When the apostle says: "If One died
for all, then all died," this is the same as saying: If One was
raised to life, then all were raised to life. Just as certainly as
Christ died, and indeed died for all people, just as certainly does
God regard all people as having died on account of their sin.
Christ's death, as the death for all people, has blotted out sin. If,
conversely, Christ was also raised in the place of all people, then
in Christ all people are declared righteous; for Christ, being
Himself righteous, had no need, for His own person, to be justified
through the resurrection — rather this happened for our sake, in
whose place He died and rose again, and so in Christ all are
justified. The reconciliation and the justification have already
taken place in God's court of judgment, but we do not yet have them.
So God has chosen the Word as the means to give them to us. We are
not to earn them through our own works, but faith is to lay hold of
them. But if faith is to do this, the Word is necessary, since
without the Word no faith is possible. The Word, and of course also
the Sacraments, are therefore the means by which the treasure is
conveyed to us. If by a "mere announcement" of forgiveness one
understands simply telling about it, then to the question whether
the preaching of the Gospel is only an announcement of absolution,
the answer must be No; rather, it is such an announcement as at the
same time gives what it proclaims. An example can make this clear.
If a rich man had set aside a great gift for someone, and someone
told me about it, this would be of no use to me; but if I, condemned
to death, lay in prison, and the king who had pardoned me sent his
servant to me with the announcement of the pardon, then I would
really be pardoned. So too God has pardoned us in Christ and has the
pardon proclaimed to me in the Gospel. Every creature has the right
to say to me: You are redeemed and reconciled with God, your sin is
forgiven you — which is why Christ also says: "Preach the Gospel to
every creature." The Lord could not have spoken more forcefully.
Wherever creation extends, there this blessed message is to be
proclaimed: mankind is redeemed and reconciled with God; whoever
believes has what the message says, namely forgiveness of sins, life,
and salvation. This further example also served to illustrate the
point: When a court has acquitted a prisoner, he is free in the
courtroom, but as long as he does not yet know it, he still is and
remains a prisoner. If the court now sends a messenger to him with
the message: you are free, this message is no mere account and empty
proclamation, but a real conveyance of freedom. So too the Gospel is
not an empty proclamation of the redemption accomplished and the
forgiveness won through Christ, but such a proclamation as actually
conveys and imparts that forgiveness.

On the observation that follows here, that the forgiveness which
has taken place on God's side is conveyed through the Gospel, and
thus, as