# Synodical Conference Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1879_S22
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

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they can boast that they have gained a brother." (Large Catechism. Eighth Commandment.)

That this stands in our Confession must be shown to the people, since in Germany they are not at all held to brotherly reproof; so that they may see that we demand nothing except what our Confessions teach, even if their pastors have kept it from them.

Attention was also called to the third foundation of church discipline, namely the congregational meetings. A narrower representation (e.g. the church council or board of the congregation) is, to be sure, not exactly against God's Word; but it is nevertheless in accordance with Scripture that the congregation itself take the administration of its affairs, and also that of church discipline, into its own hand, and its preacher should guide it to this. For this the following citation from Luther was read:

"The third way, if it should have the right manner of evangelical order, would have to take place not so publicly on the market-place among all sorts of people, but those who want to be Christians in earnest, and confess the Gospel with hand and mouth, would have to enter their names and assemble, say in a house by themselves, for prayer, to read, to baptize, to receive the Sacrament and to practise other Christian works. In this order one could recognize, punish, correct, exclude, or put under the ban those who did not conduct themselves as Christians, according to the rule of Christ, Matt. 18:15 ff. Here one could also lay a common alms upon the Christians, which they would give willingly and distribute among the poor after the example of St. Paul, 2 Cor. 9:1, 2, 12. Here there would not be need of much and great singing. . . . In short, if one had the people and persons who desired to be Christians in earnest, the order and manner would soon be made. But I cannot and may not yet order or set up such a congregation or assembly. For I do not yet have the people and persons for it; nor do I see many who press for it. But if it comes about that I must do it, and am driven to it so that I cannot refrain from it with a good conscience, then I will gladly do my part and help with the best I can. Meanwhile I will let it remain with the two ways named, and publicly among the people help promote such divine service, to exercise the young and to call and to entice the others to faith, alongside preaching, until the Christians who mean the Word in earnest find and hold to one another; so that no faction may arise from it, if I were to drive it out of my own head. For we Germans are a wild, rough, raging people, with whom it is not easy to start anything, unless the greatest need drives it." (German Mass and Order of Divine Service of the year 1526. Halle edition, vol. X, p. 271 f.)

One sees from this: the arrangement of the order of the congregation, as