# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_December 1860_S359
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

The General Synod. 359

doctrine of the Sabbath, of absolution, of the sacraments as our Church
teaches them, he does not acknowledge? This very connection has been
demonstrated by Luther and the other great theologians of our Church with such
speculative power and with such logical sharpness that one cannot wonder
enough how people can give themselves out as Lutheran theologians who show so
little acquaintance with the mighty work of the mind of our Church that they
not only stand in false doctrine, but can even claim that they stand on the
Lutheran scriptural principle and that they accept the doctrine of
justification with everything that belongs to it as antecedent and consequent.

Thus the false doctrinal direction of the General Synod is once again set
forth in its most important points. In doing so no one in the General Synod
has been approached personally, no persons have been judged or condemned; it
concerns solely and only the public doctrine. So long as this is not in accord
with Holy Scripture, testimony must again and again be borne against it from
our side. For to teach false doctrine is a grave sin, and therefore brings only
curse and ruin. Through false doctrine the name of God is blasphemed and the
Holy One of Israel is robbed of his honor; through false doctrine the sun of
grace of the gospel is darkened, and the souls of men are thereby cheated of
the most precious, the only valuable treasure of Christ's saving grace. Only
the pure doctrine sanctifies the name of God and brings grace wholly and
perfectly. It is therefore the duty of the Church and of every individual
Christian, for his part, not only himself to hold to the pure doctrine of Holy
Scripture, but also to bear witness with holy earnestness against false
doctrine. And precisely in our time this testimony may all the less fall
silent, since precisely now false doctrine is the means by which the devil
seeks to draw Christendom away and keep it far from faith in the gospel and
from the worship of God in spirit and in truth. It is the modern form of
idolatry, which finds its priests even among the servants of the Church — alas!
— even the Lutheran Church. Rightly does Luther say in the tract "Das
Papsttum zu Rom, vom Teufel gestiftet" [The Papacy at Rome, Founded by the
Devil], Erlangen ed. vol. XXVI, on the abomination of false doctrine, p. 150:
"From this (1 Peter 4:11, Titus 1:13, Matthew 15:9, 3:17, John 10:4,5,8) and
many similar sayings it is clearly and forcefully enough proven that human
doctrine and human work are strictly and harshly forbidden by God in the
Christian Church, as being contrary to faith and leading away from the truth —
that is, they are sheer lies and deceit before God. And where the devil so
strikes that men adorn them with God's name or the apostles' name and sell
them under that name, then they are no longer mere lies and deceit, but also
God's abominable blasphemy and idolatry, or abomination; for then the devil
makes God out to be a liar and a deceiver, as though God had spoken such lies
and done such works, and people fall for it and believe it and trust in it, as
though God had spoken and done it; thus they give their trust and honor, which