# Synodical Conference Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1896_S46
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

46 Proceedings of the sixteenth convention

the others were to suffer. It does happen that two or three persons in a congregation want the church at a place which happens to be convenient for them, although it would be inconvenient for the majority. In that case the congregation has no duty to give way. The congregation is indeed to care for the individuals, but not for the individual at the expense of the others. If what he ought to have can be amply distributed to him in such a way that the others too are well provided for in the process, he should not suppose that things must go according to his own head and advantage; rather the congregation has to safeguard the churchly interests of its members, to take account of the churchly interests of its members, that is, of all, as far as possible the churchly interest of the individual, but not the churchly interest of only one individual, but of every individual. In many cases it will not be so easy to determine how the various interests are to be weighed, where a collision of interests occurs, and these are the cases where there is sometimes so much trouble over the dismissal of a member to another congregation, or over the choice of a church site, or the branching off of a congregation. This does not come from the principle not being clear, the principle: The congregation exists to further the individuals toward salvation. But the circumstances are sometimes unclear, and the determination of a case according to its circumstances is often hard. One may well also be of different opinions, and remain so. There are cases about which those who are to advise can never agree, because the case at hand does not allow a sufficient determination of where it belongs. The same occurs also in marriage cases: the rules are very clear, but the case sometimes cannot be determined exactly. One must not let oneself be confused by this, as if God had not provided properly. So also here. So it may happen that, over a case which lies before us for an opinion or for handling, different persons are of different opinions, because the different persons put together the different sides of the case differently, etc. It may also happen that in the end one cannot give a definite decision, but must let it go. But the principles must remain: that Christ has redeemed the individual sinners; that the salvation in Christ is to be appropriated to the individual; that the means of grace have been instituted for this; that the chief task of the Christian congregation is this, to put the means of grace into use and to keep them in use, so that through them the individual souls, and as many souls as possible, may be saved.

Thesis VI adopted.