# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1884_S26
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

26   Proceedings of the 19th General [Synod], or

the matter over privately and with others, but should rather, as a
synod, also take the necessary steps to ensure that, as regards both
people and means, we do not stand there wholly unprepared should it
please God to assign us a field for this work — which could, after all,
happen at any moment. A committee will report on our Heathen
Mission Commission's report, together with two petitions from the
Michigan District and the New York Pastoral Conference, the latter of
which includes a motion for a mission in Armenia.

Year by year there are increasing numbers, within the Synod's
sphere, of charitable private institutions, testifying that the
orthodox church, though it does not deal in works, is not without good
works either. As far as I have been able to see (and I have visited nearly
all of them), they are honestly run and, with their modest means, some
of them accomplish proportionately more than costly state institutions
of a similar kind. Let us rejoice in this. Nor should we be too anxious
that supporting them will draw too much away from the Synod's own
institutions! The more generosity is learned for this or that particular
purpose, the more it is also learned in general, and for every good
cause. But allow me, on this occasion, to call attention to three things.
First: no institution should be founded merely to match or outdo
another place. Further: pastors should not be torn away from a
blessed pastoral ministry to be called to such institutions. Third: if
someone begins such a thing on his own, without consulting others,
relying simply on trust in God, he should afterward not burden those
others with a guilty conscience if they do not contribute to the extent
that had been expected.

Our district synods have held their sessions regularly during the
period that has passed. What was discussed has been reported in their
minutes. However different these districts may be in number and in the
composition of their gifts, in one respect they are entirely alike. Go
wherever you will in the wide territory of our Synod, and everywhere
you will find the same sincere submission to God's Word, the same love
for our church's confession, the same zeal for spreading the Gospel, the
same brotherliness toward one another. Nowhere was there the
slightest trace of factional interest, of going one's own way, or even of
party politics. Not a single discordant note has disturbed our heartfelt
harmony. I must confess that the unity of our Synod never appears to
me so clearly and so movingly as when, hurrying from district to
district and entering ever new circles, I always — find the same
brothers again. God be praised! — Given this state of affairs, we ought
not to regard it as dangerous, but should confidently encourage it, if in
more remote regions a somewhat smaller number of congregations
should also wish to join together into districts. Perhaps provision
should also be made so that, when