LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 1983, Page 101

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THEOLOGY AND CHURCH RELATIONS 101

its presence is “perceivable, its marks being the pure preaching
of the Word of God and the administration of the holy
sacraments in accordance with their institution by Christ”
(Walther, Th. V.: Mark 16:15; Ap VII-VIII 4, XIV 4; BS, 25).

4. God has ordained that all believers gathered together in
one place should establish and maintain local churches (con-
gregations) in order that they might together carry out their
Christian obligation, namely, administer the Word and the
sacraments (Office of the Keys) (Matt. 18:17; AC VIII 1: Ap
VII-VIIT 28; J. T. Mueller. Christian Dogmatics. p. 555;
Walther. Th. VI).

5. Though every Christian has authority from God to
administer the means of grace, not all have the authority to
administer them publicly in the name of the church (congre-
gation) (John 20:21-23; Luther in J. T. Mueller, p. 566).

6. In order to do publicly in the name of the congregation
that which all Christians have the right to do individually, God
has instituted the “ministry of the Word or pastoral office”
(Acts 20:28; Ap XIII 12; Walther. Th. V; BS, 31, 32).

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7. “The ministry of the Word [pastoral office] is conferred
by God through the congregation as possessor of all ecclesi-
astical power, or the power of the keys, by means of its call
which God Himself has prescribed” (Walther, Th. VI, VII:
Treatise 67, 72; Acts 1:15-16).

8. “The ministry of the Word is the highest office in the
church, and from it all other offices in the church flow”
(Walther, Th. VIII: Ap XV 42: 1 Tim. 5:17).

9. A pastor is a pastor only by virtue of his call and the
conferring of the office of the ministry on him by the congre-
gation (1 Tim. 4:14; Titus 1:5; Treatise 70; J.T. Mueller, p. 574;
Luther in J. T. Mueller, p. 566).

10. Ordination “is not by divine institution but is an
apostolic ordinance and merely a public, solemn confirmation
of the call” (Walther, Th. VI B; Treatise 70; BS, 33).

It is this order that our Missouri fathers fought so long and
hard to establish, first and foremost because it accords with
Scripture, but also because they were convinced that if this
order were not maintained and delineated clearly, all manner
of error would infiltrate the congregations, leading eventually
to error concerning the central doctrine of justification. History
and their own experience had proven this to them.

Because of their conviction both that the local church and
the office of the ministry or pastoral office were ordained by
God and that the public administration of the power of the keys
to forgive and to withhold the forgiveness of sins was granted
through the congregation, they were adamant in their stand
that the office of the ministry can be established only by a
congregation; for itis only the local congregation that has the
true marks of the church, namely, the Word and the sacra-
ments.

The Synod, they maintained, is not a church but an
organization created by a group of congregations to carry out
certain functions of their respective offices of the ministry. The
Synod is not achurch because it does not have the marks of the
church; it does not administer the Word and the sacraments!

This has been the teaching of the Synod from its earliest
days as is evidenced by the following:

The ministry of preaching is conferred by God through the
congregation ... (Walther, Th. VID.

Only a congregation can establish the public ministry (Pieper,
IIE. 439).

Wherefore it is necessary for the church[congregations] to retain
the right of calling. electing, and ordaining ministers (Treatise 67).

Itis alone the divine call extended to them mediately through the
local congregation that makes them “‘fellow-elders” of the apostles
(J.T. Mueller, p. 574).

Hence, our Synod, in agreement with the Augsburg Confession,
has stressed the truth that no one can enter the Office of the Public
Ministry without a regular call; that is, a call issued by a Christian
congregation (E. E. Foelber, Abiding Word. 1. 488).

The CTCR in its report states:

In considering the office of the public ministry one must consider the
relationship between “parish pastors” and “nonparish pastors.”
Some would deny the necessity for any distinction. To them
(Walther, Pieper, Foelber, and the whole Missouri Synod, until
recently] only men whose office of the public ministry is carried out

as pastors of congregations that are geographically locatable are
really in the ministry of Word and sacrament. Others pvint to the
personnel listing for The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod in The
Lutheran Annual. It includes 18 categories under the heading
Pastors of Missouri Synod." Only one of them is “parish pastor’ (p.
20—brackets added).

Here we have our Lutheran church fathers who based their
belief and practice solely on Scripture pitted against those
today who would point us to—of all things—The Luitheran
Annual, not Scripture alone.

The problem is this: It is clear when reading this report that
the CTCR wants the office of the public ministry (pastoral
office) conferred on everyone employed by the Synod who has a
theological degree. And they want it done under the auspices of
the Synod. But this is impossible! No group in the Synod, not
even a convention of the Synod, has the power or authority to
confer the office of the ministry on anyone. It can’t be done
because the Synod is not a church; it does not have the marks of
the church, namely, the Word and the sacraments (cp. Abiding
Word, IIT, 333—334).

Nowhere will one find—not in its Constitution, not in its
Bylaws, not in its Articles of Incorporation—any hint that this
man-ordained organization is to administer the Office of the
Keys (Word and sacraments). The Synod is nothing more than
an auxiliary organization created by congregations, not to
administer the keys, but to better fulfill the auxiliary duties of
their respective offices of the ministry.

Citing the “oversight” function of the office of the public
ministry, the CTCR report states:

If a man is asked merely to perform a necessary but only secular
function for the church but is not called to public accountability as
an overseer in the church, he is not in the office of the public
ministry. However, District presidents who are charged with the
oversight of the overseers of the flock, or professors who are charged
with the oversight of the men who are preparing to be the shepherds
ofthechurch...can be properly said to be serving in the office of the
public ministry of the church (pp. 20—21).

But this is not Scriptural. The chief function of the office of
the ministry, its very essence, is to preach the Gospel of the
forgiveness of sins by means of the Word and sacraments.
Where there is no authority to do this. there is no office, even
though the oversightings be piled a mile high.

And not one official of the Synod has this authority by
virtue of his position—not the President of the Synod, not a
President of a District, not a professor of theology; in short, no
employee of the Synod has this authority nor can any groupor
organization give them this authority. Why? Because the
Synod is not a church: it does not have the authority of the
Office of the Kevs.

To illustrate that this has been the position of the Synod
throughout its history, we note two examples:

1. As late as the 1950s, professors at our seminaries re
ceived calls from local congregations, and the office of the
public ministry was conferred on them by the calling congre-
gations.

2. Religious services at gatherings of synodical organi-
zations—whether synodical conventions, pastor and teacher
conferences, District conventions, LWML conventions—were
always sponsored by a local congregation.

Why? Because no one considered the Synod to be anything
other than an organization established by the congregations to
carry out certain auxiliary functions of the office of the
ministry with no authority to administer the means of gracein
anyone's name.

The CTCR concludes this portion of its report by accusing
Luther, Walther. Pieper. Mueller, Foelber, indeed the whole
Synod, of confusing the church: “Confusion arises when we
assume that the church can function only as one congregation
at atime, or that the ministry of Word and sacrament must be
defined only in terms of the activities of a parish pastor’ (p. 21).

Much more could be said in criticism of this report, but the
above is adequate to justify the following resolution.

Let no one conclude that this is an unimportant matter or
that it comprises an open question or adiaphoron. IftheSynod
adopts the CTCR report, it will be giving tacit approval to an
episcopal, Romanistic, hierarchical form of church govern-