# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_October 1861_S303
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Remarks on the Office. 303

individuals it seems to have been well recognizable to them. But it
really does not matter here at all whether and how the scriptural proof
for the divine institution of the ecclesiastical office for the administration
of the Word and the sacraments can be conducted, but only whether it is
accepted in the symbols of the Lutheran Church, and this seems to me to
follow beyond doubt precisely in the sense developed above, in particular
also from that passage of the Apology. For in this sense there is indeed a
command of God that the church shall appoint preachers, a mandatum
(Dei) de constituendis ministris, entirely equivalent to a divine institution
of the preaching office as an ecclesiastical office for the administration of
the means of grace.*)

To be sure, it may seem as though my understanding of the sense of
the symbols — according to which they are to teach that the Lord indeed
gave the preaching or key office immediately to the whole church, but at
the same time willed that it exercise it through duly called persons — were
at least at odds with a personal statement of Luther's, if, that is, he says
in his epistle to the people of Prague, in the passage cited by Höfling
(Grundsätze, 3rd ed., p. 232 f.): "the keys belong to the whole
congregation of all Christians, and to each one who is a member of that
same congregation, and belong to it not only with respect to the power,
but also with respect to the exercise and in every manner that may be."

But in fact Luther here only wishes to fend off the notion that, outside
an ordered church community and in cases of necessity, the exercise of
the keys too does not belong to all Christians — as though, without a
special office and call, only the bare power, never the exercise of it, ever
belonged to them. This can be recognized quite certainly from the
following words, written by him at almost the same time (Works, Erlangen
edition, vol. 22, p. 147): "So you say: yes, but how? if he is not called to
it, then surely he may not preach, as you yourself have often taught?
Answer: Here you must place the Christian in one of two situations.
First, if he is in a place where there are no Christians, there he needs no
other call than that he is a Christian, called and anointed inwardly by
God; — — in such a case a Christian, out of brotherly love, looks upon the
need of poor, ruined souls, and does not wait to see whether he is given a
command or letters from princes or bishop; for necessity breaks every law
and has no law; so love is obliged to help, where otherwise no one is there
who helps or

—————

*) It is an error that there is a lack of an express divine command. It is given in the
command the apostles received and in their being set apart. See Matt. 10:1ff., Luke 10:1ff.
The public preaching office is, after all, only a continuation of the apostolic office, which
was to last until the end. Matt. 28:19-20. Hence the apostles call even those mediately
called their fellow servants and apostles (Col. 4:7, Phil. 2:25), and call themselves fellow
elders, 1 Pet. 5:1. Therefore it is also said in our symbols: "We have a sure doctrine, that
the preaching office derives from the common call of the apostles." Smalcald Articles,
Appendix I, fol. 152. Ed. of L. and W.