Collection › LCMS Convention Workbook (St. Louis, Missouri) › 1969 · 48th Convention › Sheet 573
LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 1969, Sheet 573

Scan: The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod
Transcription machine transcription, uncorrected

542 THEOLOGY OF FELLOWSHIP

for he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his
evil deeds.”

This passage is properly applied to all who seek to
overthrow the foundation of the Christian faith, par-
ticularly those who deny the incarnation of the Son of
God in the person of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
It strikes with full force all those who would make
Jesus Christ something less than “true God, begotten of
the Father from eternity, and also true man, born of
the Virgin Mary.”

Rom. 16:17, 18

Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which
cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine
which ye have learned; and avoid them.

For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus
Christ, but their own belly; and by good words and fair
speeches deceive the hearts of the simple.

This passage, perhaps more than any other, has fig-
ured prominently in past discussions of what has come
to be called unionism, A number of widely divergent
interpretations of the Passage have been proposed,

A careful examination of this passage in its context
reveals that it occurs in a chapter aimed by the apostle
at strengthening the fellowship not only in the congre-
gation at Rome, but between the Roman church and
other Christian churches as well. Phoebe, a deaconess
of the church at Cenchrea is commended to the church
at Rome, v.1; Aquila and Priscilla, and a host of others
who were known to Paul, were to be greeted. There
are in all 14 requests by the apostle to greet certain
persons with whom he was acquainted, and who were
then in Rome, though it appears that it had never been
Paul's own good fortune to visit this great city (ef. 1:10).

After the greetings comes the request that the Chris-
tians in Rome express their fellowship with one another
with an holy kiss, v. 16, This is followed by the assur-
ance: “The churches of Christ salute you.”

Into this context of fellowship in the church in Rome
and with the Christian churches everywhere, a fellow-
ship cemented by 8reetings and sealed with the holy
kiss, comes the warning: “Now I beseech you, brethren,
mark them which cause divisions and offenses contrary
to the doctrine which ye have learned, and avoid them;
For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ,
but their own belly; and by good words and fair
speeches deceive the hearts of the simple.”

Paul does not name these disturbers of the peace
and fellowship of the church, and it is of little use for
Christians today to try to say with certainty who they
were. The following facts, however, are clear from
his words:

1. Christians must be on their guard against those

who seek to disrupt their fellowship in Christ;

2. The men whom Paul here commands his readers

to mark and avoid are not the victims of past
schisms and divisions. Rather, they cause (Greek:
tous ... poiountas; RSV: those who create dis-
sensions, etc.) divisions and offenses. Paul tries
to cement the church together in love and fellow-
ship in Christ; these men try to divide it.

3. They make these divisions and offenses “contrary
to the doctrine which ye have learned.” This doc-
trine is the Gospel, which all] Christians have
learned, and which alone brings the Christian
church into being and preserves it.®

4. Because these trouble-makers are not erring
Christians, who need to be taught, but people
who attack the church’s very foundation, namely,
the Gospel, the apostle commands the Christians
in Rome to avoid them, and judges: “They that
are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but
their own belly; and by good words and fair
speeches deceive the hearts of the simple.”

A careful study of Romans 16: 17, 18 underscores the
importance of observing the distinction between erring
Christians, who must be instructed, and heretics, who
attack the foundation of the church, as this distinction
was set forth in THEOLOGY oF FELLOWSHIP, Part II. from
writings of St. Augustine, of Luther, and from the
Preface to The Book of Concord.

Titus 3:10, 11
A man that is an heretick after the first and second
admonition reject;
Knowing that he that is such is subverted, and sin-
neth, being condemned of himself.

The term rendered “heretick” by the King James
Version is translated in the RSV as “a man that is
factious,” that is, a man who creates factions or divisions.

This rendering is in accord with the original mean-
ing of the term. Whether he makes factions by means
of false doctrine, as is usually the case, or whether he
divides the church by other means, does not alter the
church’s duty with respect to him. A man who seeks
to divide the church is to be admonished once or twice.
and then avoided. For it is evident that, if the church
successfully avoids a man who would divide it, he
cannot accomplish his aim.

The heretic or factious man, who will not yield to
admonition, is judged to be a self-condemned man.

On this passage Luther says:

Heretics do not merely err, but refuse to be instructed,
defend their error as being right, and fight against the
truth. which they know, and against their own con-
science. Concerning such St. Paul says (Titus 3:11, 12):
You are to avoid a heretic, when he has been admon-
ished once or twice, and you are to know that such a
man is perverted, and sins auto catacritos, that is,
intentionally, and against better knowledge, and wants
to remain in his error.!”

It should be obvious that Titus 3:10 should be ap-
plied, not to erring Christians, who can be corrected,
but to stubborn errorists who refuse to be instructed.

2 Cor. 6:14-18

Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers,
for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteous-
ness? and what communion hath light with darkness?

And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what
part hath he that believeth with an infidel?

And what agreement hath the temple of God with
idols? for ye are the temple of the living God: as God
hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and
I will be their God, and they shall be my people.

Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye