# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1899_S33
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Ninth Delegate Synod of Missouri, Ohio, and Other States, 1899. 33

the word of God entrusted to it, the key to all the pockets and
coffers of Christians, since with the word it unlocks the hearts of
Christians and makes them willing to serve Christ with their earthly
goods as well. There is one argument for giving that no Christian can
resist. It is this argument: "Behold, the Lord Christ, your Lord,
your Savior, who redeemed you, who bought you free from eternal
damnation with his blood, has need of your earthly goods." This
appeal, made by way of the mercy of God that has come to them in
Christ, opens the heart and hand of Christians, so long as they
remain Christians, so long as even a spark of faith remains in them.
Dr. Walther says of the effect of the word of evangelical exhortation
on Christians: "All true Christians are so constituted that with an
urgent exhortation one can, so to speak, accomplish anything with
them" (Pastorale, p. 86).

So we have shown ourselves, in a few main points, how the Christian
church can, through the word of God, accomplish everything it has
been commanded to accomplish.

4.

There is really only one danger for the church: the danger of
falling away from God's word.

When does one fall away from God's word?

It is clear that those fall away from God's word who have given up
the inspiration of Holy Scripture and therefore see in Scripture not
God's word itself, but only a report about God's word. The faith of
Christians cannot rely on a merely human report about divine
revelation. The faith of Christians requires, for its foundation,
neither more nor less than God's word.

But even those who, doctrinally, quite correctly declare the word of
Scripture to be God's word are nevertheless in danger of falling away
from God's word in practice. This happens, for example, through
compromises — that is, when the church is willing to assert only as
much of God's word as the world, and Christians who judge in the
world's manner, will put up with; or, to put it differently, only as
much as, by the judgment of human reason, is compatible with the
church's existence and welfare. Compromises are entirely in place in
the sphere of the state. The state's goal is the maintenance of
outward order. If circumstances are such that enforcing the strict
letter of the law would likely disturb outward order more than
preserve it, then the state can, and should, relax the strict letter
of the law. For the state, compromises are honest business. Luther
says: "A prince must judge by his own reason when and where the law
is to be applied in its full strictness or tempered."*)

*) E. A. 22, 95.