# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_October 1860_S310
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

310 The So-Called Millennial Kingdom.

Pray for brotherly discipline, in those circles where it can and
should be applied.

Pray that the poor sheep in the state churches may not succumb
to the grievous difficulty of joining together for the good.

Pray that the smoldering wick of the scattered, isolated, and
lonely souls in godless congregations may not go out entirely.

Pray for upright laborers who understand how to tend the plants
that the heavenly Father has planted, for shepherds who can feed the
sheep, bind up the wounded, and heal the sick.

Pray for our missions, especially the Lutheran ones, for those
in Leipzig, Hermannsburg, and in Neuendettelsau.

Pray for Israel, pray more zealously than before; turn your hearts
to the people from whom our Lord comes according to the flesh.

Pray for the great Lutheran church in America, pray for it that it
may have patience and forbearance, that it may seek the truth in love
and not lose the old treasure through the old contentiousness and vice.*)"

"Finally pray, as it is written: Come soon, Lord Jesus! And may the
Lord say to us: Yes, I am coming soon! and grant that we may stand
before him at his right hand forever. Amen.

1860. Wilhelm Löhe."

The So-Called Millennial Kingdom.

(Conclusion.)

Our chiliastic friends sense that the isolated position into which the
Apocalypse falls, according to their interpretation, is fatal to that very
interpretation. They therefore make every effort to furnish proof that a
resurrection of the righteous before the general resurrection is taught
in other passages of Scripture as well. But they have not been fortunate
in their endeavors; rather, they have thereby only brought the helplessness
of their position more clearly to light.

They rely especially on 1 Corinthians 15. "Paul — it is said**) —
clearly distinguishes three stages of the resurrection: as the firstfruits
Christ arose; afterward those who belong to him, at his parousia;
afterward — εἶτα (corresponding to the previous ἔπειτα, and again setting
a considerable interval) — the end, namely the general resurrection, the
last judgment, the separation of the wicked, when Christ delivers the
kingdom to the Father and God is all in all."

*) Did Löhe and his friends mean by this "old contentiousness and vice" not the right
struggle against false doctrine, but rather what truly deserves that name, we could only
rejoice over such a prayer for us in America and give thanks for it. L. u. W.

**) Auberlen, p. 379.