# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_October 1862_S295
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Report for the Sessions of the Synod of Missouri, etc., Western District. 295

D. Fourth Section. On the Exercise of a Congregation's Duty to Concern Itself
also with the Temporal Welfare of Its Members.

§ 33. First, the congregation should take care, as far as possible, that the
preacher have food, clothing, and lodging for himself (to which belongs also a room for
studying and for undisturbed dealing with those entrusted to him) and his
household, Matthew 10:9–11, as well as the means to show
hospitality (1 Timothy 3:2; Titus 1:8), to live solely from the Gospel, 1 Corinthians 9:14,
to devote himself to reading, 1 Timothy 4:13, to cultivate fellowship, and not to have
to entangle himself in the affairs of earning a living, 2 Timothy 2:4; Sirach 38:26–27.
According to circumstances this holds also for the teachers of the simple folk, Luke 10:7.

§ 34. The congregation should also provide food, clothing, lodging, and
all other necessary needs for the poor, widows, orphans, the aged, and
the infirm who can neither procure these for themselves
(2 Thessalonians 3:10–12; 1 Timothy 5:11–15), nor have relatives who are
particularly obligated to do so (1 Timothy 5:16); and it should likewise, in special
misfortunes — fire, famine, high prices, robbery, etc. — take up the cause of those
who have come into distress (2 Corinthians 8:13–14; Romans 12:15; 1 Corinthians 12:26);
so that no brother or sister be tempted, to the shame of the Gospel, to
appeal to the mercy of those who are outside, or even to join with them in
secret societies whose professed purpose is mutual aid,
1 Thessalonians 4:11–12; 1 John 3:17; Matthew 25:35–36, 40, 42–43, 45; James 1:27. For this
purpose the congregation should appoint special deacons for alms,
Acts 6:1–7.

§ 35. The congregation must see to it that its members in sickness
are not without the necessary help, care by day and night, and refreshment,
Matthew 25:36, 43; 1 Timothy 5:10.

§ 36. The congregation must make arrangements that every member of Christ
in its fellowship, even the poorest, be buried in an orderly, honest, and Christian
manner, Matthew 14:12; Acts 8:2; Jeremiah 22:18–19; Tobit 1:19–20.

E. Fifth Section. On the Exercise of a Congregation's Duty to See to It That
Everything Among It Proceed in an Orderly and Honest Manner.

§ 37. Besides what has already been noted in passing, the following belongs here first
of all: the pastor should keep and have in his custody two books,
in one of which, the register of souls, all the members of the congregation,
both those entitled to vote and those not so entitled, are recorded; and in the other,
the church register, the official acts performed — baptisms, confirmations,
banns, marriages, burials — are registered, with the names of the
persons, the time, the place, and other important circumstances, together with those who
have made confession and those who have communed. Both books should be
procured by the congregation and be its property.

§ 38. All letters and documents concerning the congregation,
addressed to it or issuing from it, should, where possible, be kept in the
original, and where this is not possible, in a certified copy, together with the minute-book,
by the clerk appointed by the congregation.