LCMS Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 1967, Page 64

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64 THE DOCTRINAL ESSAY

the critic from within sees the church as too much
concerned with the world.

Instead of being too negative and too long-faced, as
it appears to modern pagans, the church looks to the
critic from within as if it were putting too much em-
phasis upon the positive and becoming too complacent
about accommodation with the world.

Far from being afraid to talk to the world or to sit
across from someone else who is different, the church
should make every effort to assume the role of the fear-
ful little flock and should look with suspicion upon any-
one who is different.

Even though it is regarded by the world as hanging
out its dirty wash on a public line, the church should
energetically seek out the differences that exist within
its midst and excoriate the people who are responsible
for those differences. Some of the critics of the church
appear to be ready to go as far as to say that almost
any means are justifiable in order to accomplish the
goal of purifying the church. Even if some of those
means appear unethical to almost any thinking man,
still they are worthy when employed to achieve a
worthy end.

Criticism Not Groundless

The assertion that the church is holy dare not blind
anyone to the fact that at least some of the criticism
directed at the church cannot be termed groundless,
even though it come from sources that can properly
be described as hostile to the church. In fact, a good
case can be made for the fact that outright and honest
hostility can be more easily dealt with by the church
than studied indifference and pious perfectionism. A hos-
tile outsider can be a Pharisee too, but the finger-
pointing, holier-than-thou kind of criticism is more
likely to come from within than from without. The
publican, as our Lord declared, and even the prostitute
are likely to enter the portals of the Kingdom before
the churchly Pharisee.

We cannot play the Pharisee. There is worldliness in
the church, and concession to the ethics of the world,
its modes and morality. There is preoccupation with
the goals of the world, which are allowed to influence
the standards by which the church does its work and
measures the success of its work. At the same time
there is a lack of interest in the mission of the church
to those without. There is too little willingness to go
out beyond the gate, as our Lord did, and too little
readiness to bear His disgrace out there where it counts,
beyond the walls. There is hypocrisy and there is self-
interest. There is professionalism on the part of both
clergy and laity, instead of true Christian profession put
into genuine practice to demonstrate the worth of the
Christian faith for all to see. There are pride, prejudice,
and passion, occasionally appearing in forms which
would do credit to the world at its worst moments.

Pride

Pride expresses itself in several ways, but most often
in that critical attitude which makes some people look

down their noses at others and induces them to tear
down the good name of others in order to build up their
own spurious reputations.

Prejudice

There is prejudice, a fact none of us needs to be
told these days. What we must be told is that it is in
all of us. The danger to members of the church is that
they do not recognize their prejudices for what they
are: a reflection on the good name of Christ, who of-
fered His life for all that all might have life in His name.
What that barber said in A Time for Burning is true:
“Your Jesus is contaminated by your prejudices.”

Passion

There is passion in the church, not the passion of
our Lord to serve the world but unworthy passion which
corrodes, corrupts, and kills. There is a lack of self-
control, that permits followers of Christ to blow up
minor problems into big ones and then to blow their
tops. Indeed, there are other kinds of passions, resulting
in a growing number of divorces within the church, and
illegitimate births of children to people who have no
intention of living with each other in the holy estate
of matrimony. Passion has resulted in the violation of
the most sacred confidences, in uncontrolled ambition,
in wild and unfounded charges among brothers, and
even in embezzlement of funds by officers of congrega-
tions and by officers of the church body itself.

These are facts. What, then, does Scripture mean
when it calls the church “holy”? What do we mean
when we confess that there is one, holy, catholic, and
apostolic church?

Not Perfectionism

First of all, let us say what we do not mean. We do
not mean that the individual members of the church
have attained a state of moral perfection. Not even
the massive forces of atheism and agnosticism rampant
in the world today have done as much damage to the
Christian cause as the heresy of Christian perfectionism,
leading people to believe that once they are in Christ
they will never again have any sinful desires or engage
in any sinful action. When it finally becomes apparent
that this is a delusion, many good people become disillu-
sioned. Convinced that perfectionism is an essential part
of the faith, they lose the faith altogether. Many others
are kept even from considering the claims of Christ
upon them because they have discovered long before,
through observation of their Christian neighbors, that
moral perfection cannot be expected of even the best
Christians.

Gift of God

If the church is holy, as Jaroslav Pelikan has pointed
out, we must look beyond sexual standards or the statis-
tics on consumption of alcoholic beverages or the rela-
tive honesty of Christian and non-Christian public offi-
cials. The holiness of the church does not depend on
issues such as these. The holiness of the church is not

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