# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_August 1858_S229
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

On the Transfer of Preachers. 229

...nevertheless you must do battle with yourself and do violence to your contrary wishes, that you may fulfill the duty allotted to you. For you are not free, nor your own master. Just as, in the Jewish church, the Levites, when they performed their office at their post, did so not independently, but out of duty; and, being bound, could not wander about according to their own free will, but only by a certain necessity, and with the involvement of the knowledge, agreement, and decision of the church where they served: so likewise it is not fitting for devout servants of God to rove about, but rather to remain at their post — unless it becomes their duty, through private or public necessity, together with the sure decision and agreement of those to whom they are bound, to depart. For from such unrestrained license there tends to arise ruin for the men themselves and manifold danger for the church; whereas, on the contrary, quiet and conscientious remaining tends to bring the richest fruit for both parties.

10. Possible objections are excellently answered by the Collegium Academiae Jenensis, in Dedekennus, vol. 1, p. 533: [Objection:] "That the sayings of Jer. 3, Matt. 9, 1 Kings 13 deal with immediate calling, which others cannot make use of for themselves. Answer: It is certain that mediate calling, when it has and retains its proper requirements, is just as much divine as the first, and God says even to those whom he has called in this way: You shall go where I send you. If, then, anyone here wished to resist, he would be setting himself in opposition to God's command, which through the regular call (brought about through means) has commanded him: You shall go where I send you."

11. Secondly, it might be objected: The pastor now possesses a lawful, divine, and regular call, which he ought not to leave without cause, nor should he let himself long for innovation. But to this it is easy to answer: that the other regular call annuls the former one. For otherwise the pastor could not, in good conscience, have accepted that pastoral charge some years ago in the first place, seeing that he had previously been in church service in another place as well.

To this we wish to answer out of Bidenbach's Theological Deliberations, approved by the Tübingen theologians: Since a call that comes about through means is, coming from those who occupy a divine office, itself a divine call, it follows that a preacher (already in office), when he is in this manner called elsewhere by a Christian magistracy and congregation, and finds upon examination of his own person and qualifications that he is competent and, according to need, fit for the office laid upon him, ought to regard such a call as divine, follow it, and on no account whatsoever despise it out of hand — provided only that he does not otherwise wish to resist the Holy Spirit, who calls him, or has some particular reasons to raise against it. — It is incumbent upon preachers, when such a call comes to hand beyond all expectation, that they keep an eye on God, and diligently reflect—