# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_April 1860_S100
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

100 On the Zeal of Preachers.

must spur our diligence yet more is Satan's own and his rabble's untiring
zeal! They are stirred up in mighty rage, and the devils themselves seem
in this feeble old age of the world to be possessed by worse devils still.
They leave nothing untried; they strain every power to the utmost, secretly
and openly, by cunning and by combat, that they may drag as many as
possible with them into hell. What weeds, what stumbling-stones, what
seed of strife do they not sow? They compass land and sea, the whole
circle of the earth, to make but a single proselyte, Matthew 23:15. Such
raging zealots are the Jesuits, whom a poet describes in these words:
"Undeterred the Jesuit journeys to far India and seeks a disciple, without
fear of the sea, of stones, or of fire; and when he has found him, he makes
him twice as bad as he himself is." Let us learn even from the great
deceiver of the world, who continually roams the earth, that he may
entangle, ensnare, and deceive men with his arts and nets. Hence the
excellent martyr Latimer, when he exhorted the bishops to diligence, said:
if they would not follow the example of the saints, the prophets, the
apostles, and especially of Christ himself, they should at least let
themselves be moved by the example of the devil. For he pays the most
diligent visits, and teaches, moves, and drives his followers unceasingly.
Indeed, even the ocean surges constantly, the heavens circle in ceaseless
motion, and the sun, the great governor of change, runs with untiring
brilliance ever from one end of the heavens to the other: if the dumb and
unreasoning bodies of the world thus complete so many courses without
interruption, shall the heads of the church then have been created only
to be overcome by sloth and dullness? The slothful, surely, are hateful to
God in every calling, but most of all in the holy office. Cursed is he who
does this work negligently. —

And if you are a servant of the Word, act accordingly. For a preacher's
life is no idle and soft life: we are hired for labor in the Lord's vineyard,
Numbers 8:24, not for play. It is therefore quite unseemly that the
servants of Christ should be gamblers, hunters, tradesmen (speculators),
soldiers, farmers, and the like. For if it is not fitting that they should
neglect the preaching of the Word and serve tables, Acts 6:2, it is still less
fitting to neglect the Word of God in order to have time for things of
another kind. Salary, indeed, is given, but on account of the office; wages
are owed, but to workmen; double honor is due them, but to those who
"labor."

This office we hold, then (believe me), is no office of sluggish idleness,
but a service full of labor, whose care has always been greater than its
glory and whose sweat greater than its harvest. "Know," says Augustine,
"that the name pastor (episcopus) is the name of a work, not of a rank, and
that those are pastors who wish not to rule but to be of use." Our office is
called by the following names: