# Synodical Conference Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1912_S22
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

22 Proceedings of the twenty-fourth convention

Norwegian synods of our country, in which your Honorable Synod also takes part. It has also discussed in detail, for more than two days, one day in the presence of your Honorable Delegates, the published articles of agreement, the so-called "Opgjör," and has examined it closely by Scripture and Confession, since it is indeed a matter of a union with a Norwegian church body which thirty years ago and ever since has repeatedly opposed and rejected the doctrinal position of the Synodical Conference, especially in the articles on conversion and the election of grace [*Gnadenwahl*]. This examination of the "Opgjör" moves us, venerable, dear fathers and brethren, to ask you as cordially as urgently to give us a hearing on the following three points, so that with you as with us the one pure truth of the divine Word and of the Lutheran Confession may be definitely, clearly and firmly confessed, maintained and defended against all error, the consciences bound in God's Word and in the Lutheran Confession be quieted, and unity of faith among us all be preserved.
We therefore ask your Honorable Synod, for the sake of the Confession:
1. in Theses 1-3 on the election of grace, to remove the equation of the so-called first and second forms of doctrine, since only the first is the truth of Scripture and of the Confession, while the second has no ground in God's Word and in the Confession of the Lutheran Church and therefore has no justification in the Church;
2. to bring about in the theses a rejection of human conduct, especially also of the omission of the so-called wilful resistance by natural powers or powers of grace, as the explanatory ground why God has converted and elected some before others, as is taught by our opponents in the American Lutheran Church, since the present church conditions demand such an antithesis;
3. to hold with us a Christian-brotherly discussion of the earlier theses on the calling and conversion and of the present ones on the election of grace according to Scripture and Confession, in truth and in love.
We beg and implore God, the Father of our LORD Jesus Christ, the great and only LORD of the Church, that He grant a favorable hearing to our fraternal letter, demanded by duty and conscience, with your Honorable Synod, and direct the whole matter to the glorification of His name and to the salvation of many souls.
We have also appointed three delegates to represent orally what we have written here.
In the name and by commission of the Ev. Luth. Synodical Conference of North America, there sign:
[Signed.] C. Gausewitz, President.
Joh. Meyer, Secretary.
Saginaw, Mich., 19 August 1912.