# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1872_S64
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

[p. 64]

—and quite specifically of the very last times Luke 18:8 speaks: "When the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?" This passage rules out the opinion that a general victory of the Gospel will yet take place before the Last Day. The passage 1 Timothy 4:1ff. too has without doubt already been fulfilled by the papacy, for this passage is not so much a description of the mockers of religion in the very last times as it is of the Antichrist. The fallen unbelievers of the present age are in fact not the ones who "speak lies in hypocrisy" — they come out openly with their unbelief. They do not "forbid to marry." Still less do they forbid "to abstain from meats"; rather they recommend gluttony and drunkenness, so as to squander the time of grace through them. The last time is in general described in holy Scripture as a time of the very greatest complacency; hence the Lord says it would be in those days as in the days of Noah and Lot: "they did eat, they drank, they married wives, and were given in marriage, until the flood came." If we look at our own time and compare the conduct of people with these words, we must say: so it is. Our time differs from Luther's in this, that in his day, too, godless ways were indeed present, but they had not become the ruling spirit of the age. Now the craving to make a heaven for oneself on earth has seized the masses and guides them. The world has advanced in every kind of art and science and has made great progress in them, but it applies all of this to making life as pleasant as possible, so as to be able to do without heaven. And because we Christians still have flesh and blood about us, a great danger lies in this for us too, of again becoming complacent and entangled in the ways of the world. It will therefore happen that this complacency grows ever more dreadfully, even among Christians, until it comes to this: when the Lord comes, shall he find faith? As in Noah's time only eight souls were preserved from the general destruction, so it will also go with us when the Lord comes. But we must in particular picture vividly to ourselves that the devil will rage and storm above all against the rightly-believing church. If we part ways this time without pondering, with fear and trembling in our hearts, that the devil will already in the coming days be making plans for how to bring us down and destroy us, then we have already lost sight of God's Word; for God's Word tells us the devil has and keeps no rest, and who knows where he has already laid nets and snares to catch us. But if we believe that the danger is there, that will be the best means of keeping us watchful and on our guard. For as soon as we then hear the voice of the stranger, we will say: now it is time to take care that we are not led away from the truth. Oh, that we might all leave this place with the thought: we want to keep our eyes open and watch. For that it is here—