# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1847 09 08_S4
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—and have thereby given a wholesome Christian teaching!

But we poor sinners, who are entirely without the Spirit, say against such holy Christians, out of the holy Gospel, thus: "He that loveth father or mother, wife and children, house and home, yes, his own soul, more than me, is not worthy of me" (Matt. 10:37), and again, verse 34: "I came not to send peace on earth, but a sword"; and Paul: "What concord hath Christ with Belial?"

Should we now be one with them in a Christian sense and have Christian love toward them, then we would also have to love their teaching, and let it please us, or at least tolerate it. Let whoever wishes do that — not I. For Christian unity stands in the Spirit, in that we are of one faith, one mind, one spirit. Eph. 4:6.

This, however, we are gladly willing to do: outwardly we will be one with them, that is, we will keep bodily, temporal peace. But spiritually we will avoid, condemn, and rebuke them, as long as we have breath, as heretics, perverters of God's Word, blasphemers and liars; and besides this, we will suffer from them, as from enemies, their persecution and division, so far and as long as God allows it, and will pray for them, and also admonish them to desist. But to consent to their blasphemy, or to keep silent about it, or to approve it, that we will not and cannot do.

I have exposed all this so that people may see how the devil can adorn himself under a false humility, peace, and patience — as a warning to all who do not humble themselves from the heart, that they may be on guard both against the devil and against themselves. For God does not let himself be deceived or mocked; he would sooner take a she-ass and, through her mouth, condemn great prophets, as he did with Balaam. Num. 22:28ff. Therefore we may well say to such fanatics and spirits, who offer us such a peace, what Christ said to his betrayer Judas in the garden: "O Judas, dost thou betray the Son of man with a kiss?" Luke 22:48. Yes indeed, it is a Judas-like peace and a treacherous kiss, when they wish to be friendly toward us, and seek to obtain from us that we should keep silent and look on at their arson and murder, whereby they bring so many souls forever into the fire of hell, and want it to be regarded as a small and trifling matter. God warns us of these spirits precisely by letting them come out into the open in this way, and betray and reveal themselves, showing how they deal in lies and falsehood. And whoever is not alarmed or warned by such behavior, let him go his way — he wishes to be lost. The Holy Spirit does not speak and present such things through his poor sinners, as the devil here does through his "saints."

(Submitted.)
Report on the St. Louis District Ministers' Conference of the German Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Missouri, Ohio, and Other States.

This was held at Altenburg, Perry Co., Mo., on August 19, 1847, and the following days. Present were the pastors Löber of Altenburg, Perry Co., Mo.; Gruber of Paitzdorf, Perry Co., Mo.; Keyl of Frohna, Perry Co., Mo.; Walther of St. Louis; Best of Palmyra, Marion Co., Mo.; Saupert of Evansville, Ind.; Lochner of Collinsville, Ill.; Wolf of Perryville, Perry Co., Mo.; Fick of Neu-Melle, St. Charles Co., Mo.; and, in addition, as guests, the students Müller and Löber. Pastor Löber was elected chairman, and the undersigned was elected secretary. Having returned from this conference, I cannot refrain from communicating the following to the dear readers of this paper.

The sessions each day were opened and closed with prayer, following a briefly expounded biblical text or passage. In the proceedings, for several reasons, the practice was introduced whereby the younger ministers, according to seniority in office, gave their judgment and opinion first, in ascending order. After a colloquy was held on August 21 with two of the assembled ministers, they were ordained on Sunday, before the numerously assembled congregation, by the president of the Synod, who was present among us. On the same day two guest sermons were preached.

With regard to the internal arrangement of the conferences, it was agreed that they should last four days, inclusive of one Sunday. Their officers are elected for only one year. Whoever has particularly important and difficult questions to lay before the conference is to make them known to its members by letter or through the Lutheraner. The St. Louis District Ministers' Conference is divided into three circuits: Perry County, St. Louis, and Illinois, whose members mutually review one another's sermons and bring their judgment on them to the next conference. Each member is to bring his sermon to the next Synod.

It had been charged to the conference by the Synod to confer with the Reverend Pastor Keyl regarding the petition of his congregation concerning private confession. After Pastor Keyl had read aloud a treatise on private and general confession, it was resolved that it should be communicated, with some alterations, in the Lutheraner. The conference then issued the following declaration, by which Pastor Keyl hoped that his congregation would be satisfied: 1. that the conference also considers general confession to be, in a sense, unlutheran, insofar as it, with perhaps a few exceptions, was never customary in the best period of the Lutheran Church; 2. that the addition in Chapter V, § 14 of our constitution could indeed be misused by those who are indifferent or hostile to the excellent institution of private confession, but that, as the conference hopes, a new addition will be adopted by the Synod that will forestall such misuse. The Reverend Pastors Löber, Gruber, and Wolf likewise declared, together with Pastor Keyl, that they had thereby been satisfied on this point.

The addition, which was to be proposed at the next Synod, was then provisionally discussed and drafted.

The conference deliberated at some length on Chiliasm. This is the name given to the erroneous teaching that Christ will appear again on earth, even before the Last Day, to establish a thousand-year flourishing condition of the Church, in which there will be no more strife and no more offense. On this subject several theses by Pastor Gruber and a treatise by Pastor Brohm were read aloud, and it was shown that the Württemberg theologian Bengel stands in contradiction to Luther with respect to the prophetic numbers, although he himself, in his investigations in the field of prophetic theology, appeals to Luther. For the latter states, in his preface to the Revelation of John, that the thousand years of chapter 20 of Revelation have already been fulfilled, from the suffering of Christ up to the year 1073, and reckons the number of the beast, 666, from Pope Hildebrand onward, whereas Bengel places the number of the beast before the 1000 years. Among the more recent defenders of Chiliasm, it is usually claimed, in justification of it, that the Church, in the course of time, advances step by step toward a greater perfection and a deeper knowledge, and that accordingly the last age will be its most splendid flowering. But it is contrary both to Holy Scripture and to the history of the Church to apply the notion of such an organic development to it. For according to the words of Christ, tares will always be found among the wheat until the end of the world (Matt. 13:30, 39); indeed, the times will grow ever more grievous as the end approaches (2 Tim. 3:1; Luke 18:8). So too the history of the Church shows no steady progress toward the better, but rather now times of deep decline, now times of special visitations of grace; in its appearance it thus resembles the waning and waxing moon, which shines now with greater, now with lesser brightness. The two most glorious periods of splendor of the Church have so far been the apostolic age and the age of the Reformation. Yet the Church's knowledge in this world always remains only a fragment, and it must therefore always remain a pupil of the Word. Chiliasm, then, is not refuted by setting one human calculation against another, but by testing its assertions according to the analogy of faith and striking down its errors with the clear passages of Holy Scripture. In general, all prophecy is only rightly understood after its fulfillment. Chiliasm, moreover, is especially dangerous precisely because it must ground its belief not on God's clear Word, but on the wavering authority of human interpretation. Holy Scripture, incidentally, teaches plainly that the Last Day may come on any day whatsoever, for which reason all interpretation and calculation that overturns this teaching is false.