# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_M rz 1859_S84
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

How should a pastor conduct himself at the sickbed of his parishioners? 84

soul, had served their God and sought his honor; whether they harbored
no enmity against anyone, or had at least once done so; whether they
had truly loved their neighbor as themselves, and had sought and
furthered his advantage rather than their own. Such and similar
questions of the Law, which cut to the conscience, make the
self-righteous sick person either despondent and downcast — so that
the way to true repentance has now been opened, and one can then,
once the heart has become small, humble, lowly, and despondent in
itself, apply the Gospel with its sweet comfort — or else these questions
of conscience seem not to touch the heart of the sick person at all, and
he remains captive in the self-deception that he has the right faith and
a gracious God, and will certainly be saved. If the latter is the case,
then love, which is never weary, will attempt two further things:
namely, first, to explain conversationally what believing actually
means. To believe, to believe in Christ, does not yet mean this: that
one is a baptized Christian, has held to God's Word, attended church,
made use of the Holy Supper, and indeed lived uprightly and honestly
before the world; rather, to believe in Christ means to place one's sole
trust, comfort, and confidence in Jesus Christ, as the only Savior of
sinners, through the power of the Holy Spirit. Where this faith lives in
the heart, there a man despairs of himself and all his works, sincerely
and heartily acknowledges and repents of his sins, and brings forth
genuine fruits of repentance — and that not in order to escape the
eternal punishment of hell and the wrath of God, but out of love for
Christ, who let it cost him so dearly to redeem us from our sins.
Through this faith a man receives the Spirit of Christ, by whom he lets
himself be led, guided, and governed, so that the man dies to the world,
and with his trust, in joy and in sorrow alike, holds fast to Christ, and
looks to him for all good things — so that the man is not arrogant in
good days, nor despondent in evil days, but is patient; and also so that
mockery and scorn from the world's side do not weary him of bearing
Christ's cross, but rather he is glad and willing to suffer everything
here with Christ, in order one day to be able to reign with him forever,
and finally also to give up everything — possessions and goods, body
and life — should it be required, for the Lord, who did not think it
beneath himself, out of great love, to give himself up as a bloody
sacrifice on the cross for us. After such a description of true, living
faith, the pillars of self-righteousness will surely collapse, and to the
question put to the sick person, whether he has had such a faith and
has proven his faith as a truly reborn child of God, one will likely
receive the crestfallen answer: "No, such a faith I have not had." And
thereupon, perhaps at a later visit, if it can be managed, one can
comfort the broken heart — now stripped of its self-righteousness by
God's grace — with the sweet Gospel, which reveals to us so gloriously
the love and mercy of the sinner's friend.