# Synodical Conference Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1884_S48
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

46 Proceedings of the tenth convention

So it is exactly now also. The doctrine of our opponents has a great appearance, and therefore it also has a great following. For all the newfangled believers in Germany, even though they themselves hold an entirely different doctrine from our opponents, nevertheless call out to these: You are right! namely right in this, because it is more in accord with reason. Hence we too know where the general applause comes from.

But these are earnest words of Luther: "They do not know how hard it is to stand before God without God's Word." So long as one does not think in earnest: This doctrine I shall have to answer for on the Last Day before the general Judgment of the world, so long will he also not look in earnest to see whether he stands with it on the right ground. But you may die at any moment. How? when your conscience then calls out to you: are you now also ready to answer before God for that to which you said Yes? Therefore look well to how it stands with you. Can you say: Lord, thy Word has taught me so? Or is it with you: There was a great controversy, and I sided with those who, like a Hunnius, Polyc. Leyser, Gerhard, Quenstedt and other pious Fathers, teach, and I think that will surely be right? If it is so, then you are lost in the last hour. Then the devil will say: "Are these then your gods? See, so you are now lost, you come to me." Only then will one stand against the evil enemy when he says: What do all men matter to me? Scripture teaches so and so I believe it.

Luther therefore writes: "If I am to be deceived, I would rather be deceived by God (if it were possible) than by men; for if God deceives me, he will surely answer for it and make restitution to me. But men cannot make restitution to me if they have deceived me and led me into hell. Such defiance the enthusiasts cannot have, for they cannot say: I will rather stand on the text which Zwingli and Oecolampadius speak in discord than on that which Christ himself speaks in concord. Accordingly you can speak cheerfully to Christ, both at your dying and at the Last Judgment, thus: My dear Lord Jesus Christ, a quarrel has arisen over thy words in the Supper; some want them to be understood otherwise than they sound. But since they also teach nothing certain, but only confuse and make uncertain, and can in no way nor will prove their text, I have remained on thy text, as the words sound. If anything is dark in it, thou hast willed to have it so dark; for thou hast given no other explanation of it, nor commanded one to be given. . . . See, no enthusiast will be able to speak so with Christ, that I know well; for they are uncertain and disunited over this text." (Confession concerning the Lord's Supper of Christ. Anno 1528. Tomus XX, 1300 f.)

Luther called the doctrine of the Reformed on the Supper a double-