# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_Januar 1862_S20
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

20 The Lutheran and Missionary.

and thereby refuse the sweet bond of Christian brotherhood to those who sincerely love our Lord Jesus Christ."

The practical principle stated here is unionism carried to its fullest extent. Unity in doctrine and sacrament is the essence of all churchly union; wherever that exists, all other points of division are non-essential. And were the General Synod to act consistently, it would have to enter into churchly, brotherly fellowship — form one church, one congregation — with every sect that "sincerely loves Jesus Christ," and every Christian sect will claim this of itself; even Roman Catholics say, yes, they sincerely love Christ; even the rationalist boasts of this love of Jesus. It would also have to give up the name "Lutheran," for Paul forbids the "of Paul," "of Cephas," "of Apollos" within a fellowship that is united in doctrine and the use of the sacraments. Only those Lutherans have a right to call themselves Lutheran who will not and cannot enter into churchly fellowship with any other sects, because those sects depart from the word of God. There, then, the distinguishing name does not have its origin in the separatist urge of arrogant schismatics, but in faithfulness to the confession against all who do not obey the truth. —

"American Lutheranism," then, wants first of all to build no sectarian hedges around the pulpits — that is, it wants to let every possible sectarian preacher, Episcopalian, Presbyterian, Baptist, Methodist, Union-church minister, etc., preach in its churches, sow their seed in its field. Is that right? Has the Lutheran Church ever permitted this? Does that mean faithfully administering the office of a bishop? — God commands: "Beware of false prophets!" Now, evidently, it is not only he who rejects the whole word of God who is a false prophet, but everyone who falsifies even a part of it; whoever sows even a little weed-seed shall not be tolerated in the vineyard, for also "a little leaven leavens the whole lump." Now although Lutheran preachers are far from wishing to deny Christianity, or sincere love for Jesus Christ, to all preachers of other denominations — since that is, after all, only the business of fanatical papists — they nevertheless know, and indeed from the confession of the sects themselves, that such sectarian preachers hold false doctrines alongside true ones; and is it not then wholly unconscionable and faithless to permit such men the pulpit, to give them the opportunity to bring the weeds, the leaven, into the very congregation entrusted by God? — The objection, that such sectarian preachers are cultivated, sensitive gentlemen who would not exactly emphasize and preach the false doctrines in a foreign congregation, but would keep to decent generalities, is too weak for one to need to bring any heavy artillery against it. It suffices to say that the word of God does not permit turning the pulpit into a parlor, where one practices mutual courtesies. — Moreover, such a procedure, like all sham courtesies, lacks true love. One should say to such men: We know, from the confession of their own