# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_Februar 1858_S48
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

48 Menius and Flacius in Their Dispute over Ministry and Priesthood.

...should take heed both to themselves and to the whole flock over which the Holy Spirit has set them as bishops."

"Here you see clearly how, according to the divine order which the Lord Christ established and instituted through his apostles, the calling and appointment to church government is to be conducted — namely, that no one shall be admitted to such an office uncalled, unexamined, and untested; that is one point. Secondly, you hear that every city and every parish shall have its own particular ministers. — —"

"If, then, Illyricus wishes to have acted, and still to act, according to God's Word, command, and order, as he swore in baptism, it behooves him to prove who called him and who commanded him to take up church government, and in particular to set himself above other church servants, to sit in judgment on them and to reform them. Likewise, that he prove who examined and tested him and found him fit for it."

"If Illyricus, on account of his baptism and the Ten Commandments, were obliged to act as he does, it would follow inescapably that all baptized Christians would have to do likewise. Now if every uncalled person wished to judge and govern over all ministers in all churches, and to acquit or condemn them at his own pleasure, pray, what would come of that?"

"He pretends that it is sufficiently proven from God's Word that all Christians are priests and can interpret Scripture, but that one or several are chosen for the office in order to avoid disorder. In this he displays his high understanding of Christian doctrine, being in this matter almost as masterly as the donkey with the harp. That all Christians are priests is true — in the sense that they may, in every place and at every time, offer spiritual sacrifices through prayer, thanksgiving, and all manner of good works, likewise through patience in all manner of afflictions, etc. But that they can all interpret Scripture, or that they all together have the power to take upon themselves teaching and governing in the Church, that is not so. For to interpret Scripture is a special gift of the Holy Spirit, which God gives not to all, but only to those to whom he wills to give it, 1 Corinthians 14. For if all Christians had this gift, what need would there be of the preaching office, which was instituted chiefly so that those who have the gift of interpreting Scripture should serve the others who do not have that gift, and teach them from Scripture? So too it is not a free matter with the offices and ministries in the Church, that any and every man should take one upon himself and administer it, even though he may fancy that he could and would do it better than another; rather, it is God's earnest commandment, order, and ordinance that no one shall take any office upon himself of his own presumption and outrage, unless he be called thereto according to divine order and be commissioned to it — of which der Wende makes not much outcry, but says only that one or several are chosen