# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1860_S44
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

— Page 44 —

as many old Agendas [liturgical service-books] say, the conscience is
made "restful" — the following illustration was added: Picture God
as a wealthy man who draws up, in my name, a note of hand for a
million. Once God has signed it, the sum is my own property, for the
note is made out to my name. But the note must be brought to me, so
that I know of it and become certain and glad of the gift. Now God
has signed it through the raising of His Son; only I do not yet have
the note in hand. Therefore the Lord Christ instituted the preaching
office, that is, made the arrangement that the Gospel should be
proclaimed; through this message the million gold guilders are
brought to me. The word of the Gospel is an announcement
of what God has long since done; that is why it brings
the treasure of forgiveness. The issuer of the note has
made the man rich, even though he does not yet know it; through the
proclamation he learns of it, and thereby the wealth is also made
over to him. Because the Church also uses, among other things, the
absolution formula "I proclaim to you the forgiveness," many suppose
that absolution is an empty proclamation. The formula "I proclaim to
you the forgiveness" is entirely correct, good, and precious; but
since it could easily be understood in the sense of the Reformed
false doctrine, we do not use it alone. Because the announcement
really is forgiveness, we therefore also say: "I forgive you your
sins." Christ's word, "Go into all the world," etc., is the same as
that other word, "Whosesoever sins ye remit," etc.; in the latter
saying only the meaning, power, and effect of the Gospel is
indicated; no new office, alongside and outside the office of the
Gospel, is thereby established, but it is merely taught that the
office of the Gospel is nothing other than the office of the
forgiveness of sins.

An objection to the foregoing explanations was raised as follows:
If I believe in Christ, I have forgiveness of sins, and absolution
can therefore bring me nothing that I do not already have. Through
Word and Baptism, forgiveness has been made my own; I have it,
therefore, constantly and unshakably; absolution can accordingly be
for me only a reminder of what I already have. If I forget this,
absolution says to me: Remember what you have. When Peter walked on
the sea, all went well so long as he remembered Christ's word, "Come
here"; but when, at the sight of the storm, he forgot this word and
began to sink, Christ stretched out His hand to him so that he would
not go under. That hand, which pulled Peter out, is to us absolution,
which comforts us when the sun of grace of the forgiveness that has
already taken place is covered over for us with clouds of temptation.
Absolution is thus only comfort against temptation, doubt, and
faintheartedness.

Against this it was recalled that the speaker no doubt understood
absolution in the narrower sense, whereas we are speaking generally
of the Gospel as absolution. It was further answered: what has just
been said, taken at its plain words, still rests, it would seem, on
a mistaken notion. The grace we receive is not something we pocket
away, as one puts a piece of bread into one's pocket, so that one
could say: what I have already pocketed cannot be