# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1872_S53
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

— 53 —

we cannot admit any Episcopalian, any Presbyterian, any Methodist to our Communion so long as he does not confess with us. But those who do admit such people thereby show that they believe the Reformation was a revolution, and that Luther did wrong when, at Marburg, he refused to extend his hand to the Reformed, who did not rightly confess on the article of the Lord's Supper. Those who practice and tolerate such a practice are simply Unionists [*Unirte*]. If they call themselves Lutheran, that only makes it worse, since they use this precious name while having neither Lutheran doctrine nor Lutheran practice. But it is not the name that matters, but what the name signifies — that is what counts. It may be that the name will one day be taken from us too. Already we are being called "the Missourians." It could even come to the point where we are no longer allowed to call ourselves Lutherans at all. It would not be the first time that Christians holding the pure doctrine had their name taken from them. They were first called Christians, then Catholics, then Evangelicals and Protestants. The first name was stolen by the sects of the earliest times, the second by the papists, the third was taken from us by the Unionists, the last by the rationalists. So the name "Lutheran" too may be taken from us again. Indeed, those devoted to pure Lutheran doctrine have long since been called "Old Lutherans" [*Altlutheraner*]. In sum: it is not the name but the doctrine that everything depends on.

Adjourned with the Lord's Prayer.

First continuation of the deliberations on the Guiding Theses.*)

First, a member of the Synod asked for further clarification of a point in the adopted minutes, connected with an exegetical question. The adopted minutes stated that the verbal inspiration [of Scripture] follows from the saying, "Man doth not live by bread alone," etc. It was not clear to him that this saying proves that. The following answer was given: when the Lord Jesus speaks of the Word of God — particularly at that place where he contends with the devil — he makes clear that he is speaking neither of a word handed down by tradition or spoken aloud, nor even of the word he himself is at that moment uttering (which would itself be a spoken word), but of the word of Scripture. When the Israelite heard of the Word of God, of the statutes of God, of the testimonies of God, he never understood anything by it other than Scripture. So when Christ says that man lives by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God, then, although not directly, not explicitly, the verbal inspiration of Holy Scripture is nevertheless indirectly expressed in it. — After it was then noted that this was neither the time nor the place to take up such exegetical questions, which ought rather to be dealt with at conferences, it was resolved to set this point aside and proceed to the business at hand. To

*) Minutes composed by Pastor J. G. Nützel.