# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_April 1859_S110
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

110 On the Care Most Necessary for a Preacher in His Conduct.

...to guard against giving offense. When those who confess the name of Christ, and are regarded before the world as confessors of Christ, lead such a conduct as stands in contradiction to their own confession, or even runs counter to the principles of an honorable heathen, that is the grievous, twofold crime by which the ministry of the Gospel is brought into reproach. The Gospel is a light set upon a high lampstand; whoever confesses it places himself upon that same high place, from which he is seen by everyone, by friend and foe alike. But on no one does the world look with sharper eyes than on Christians, to discover in them something they can blame. It seeks to belittle their virtues, to magnify their faults, and to lay their vices to the charge of the Gospel, and for the sake of the former to bring reproach upon the latter. Although it is indeed a most unjust conclusion to charge the fault of persons to the Gospel, yet those who give occasion for such an unjust conclusion nevertheless commit a grievous sin. With every sin they commit a twofold sin: first, that they act against one of God's commandments; and second, that they cause the name of God to be blasphemed — and therefore, without doubt, they shall receive a twofold damnation.

What has just been said lays upon every Christian the sacred obligation to be doubly careful in his whole conduct, not only so that he does not, for his own person, heap up God's judgment upon himself, but also so that he brings no disgrace upon the holy Gospel. This caution requires, in part, the avoidance of what is truly evil, and in part the avoidance of the appearance of evil, or of such actions as, though they do not in themselves involve the transgression of any express commandment, are nevertheless regarded by weak Christians as sinful acts.

What is said to all Christians in general — let us give no one any occasion of offense — is said to the preacher of the Gospel in an intensified degree. They stand upon a high watchtower, from which they are seen by everyone. They are to be the salt of the earth, a light of the world. They are to promote the kingdom of Christ, namely through sound doctrine, but also through a blameless life. Although sound doctrine is the first and foremost requirement of a preacher, a blameless life is by no means to be reckoned a matter of secondary importance. Through their teaching they have the task of setting forth the necessity of an upright Christianity according to faith and love; through their life they are to prove to their hearers the possibility and reality of the same. When a preacher's doctrine and life do not agree, it cannot but happen that with one hand he tears down what he builds with the other. For this reason St. Paul, too, made such high demands on the life of a bishop, as he does in writing to Timothy and Titus. If a so-called layman gives offense through a sinful life, a preacher causes ten, a hundred, indeed a thousand times as much damage — and how great, think you, will

his damnation be?