Collection › LCMS Convention Workbook (St. Louis, Missouri) › 2019 · 67th Convention, Tampa › Page 12

LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2019, Page 12

Scan: The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod

Transcription machine transcription, uncorrected

OFFICER, BOARD, AND COMMISSION REPORTS
For we do not teach anything different from what you teach; nor is
it better or sublimer.”10

The life together of the apostles was based upon having the
same foundation in Jesus Christ, that is, holding to the same doctrine. This life together is not created by us but by the Lord. When
the same doctrine is recognized in another Christian or in a church
body, we have a life together.
11. On being Lutheran today for the sake of Witness, Mercy, Life
Together. “The Gospel and Baptism must traverse the world,”11
said Luther. This is what Lutheran missions care about—faithfully preaching repentance and faith in Jesus’ name, baptizing, and
teaching so that those who belong to Christ in every nation are
built up in His Word and fed with His body and blood. Mission
is, to use the words of Wilhelm Löhe, “the one church of God in
motion,” calling, gathering, and enlightening unbelievers through
the pure teaching of the Gospel. This definition lies at the heart
of what it means to be Lutheran in mission. Lutheran mission
is defined by an unqualified (quia) subscription to the Book of
Concord as the correct exposition of the Holy Scriptures. We are
in harmony in the one biblical Gospel and the Sacraments instituted by Christ. Rejecting theological pluralism and its offspring
universalism, Lutheran mission is grounded in the exclusive claims
of Jesus Christ, knowing outside of His Word, which is spirit and
life, there is only darkness and death.
12. The Church today as a community of Witness, Mercy, Life
Together. When German mission leader and theologian of the
last generation Friedrich Wilhelm Hopf (1910–82) asserted, “The
Lutheran Church can only do Lutheran missions,” he was observing that the Lutheran confession is inseparable from mission.12
There is no Church without mission, and no mission without the
Church. Evangelism becomes the Church’s mission when its goal
is gaining souls for the local community of believers and planting
the church as a witnessing, merciful community of believers. When
confession and mission are pulled apart, both suffer. Mission
without confession is reduced to zealous fanaticism. There can be
no confession without mission, for confession takes place before
God and in the presence of a listening world. The mouth of confession is the voice of mission always proclaiming that Jesus Christ
is the God who justifies the ungodly, giving life to the dead in the
forgiveness of sins. And this forgiveness of sins is found only in
the Christian Church, where the Holy Spirit “daily and richly forgives all my sins and the sins of all believers,” to use the words
of the Small Catechism. That is why, in the Book of Acts, those
who received the preaching of the apostles were baptized, being
added to the Church, says Luke (Acts 2:41). In the church created
by mission, which has at its heart the preaching of the Gospel,
those brought to faith “devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, the breaking of bread and the prayers” (Acts
2:42). Church and mission go together; you do not have the one
without the other.
The claim, no doubt disputed in our day, that Lutheran missions lead to Lutheran churches is far from a parochial appeal
to brand-name loyalty or mere denominationalism. Instead, it is
the recognition that the Holy Spirit calls, gathers, enlightens, and
sanctifies a holy Christian people through the pure preaching of
the Gospel and Sacraments administered according to the divine
Word. Lutherans are glued to the scriptural truth that the Spirit
works faith in the hearts of those who hear the Good News of
Jesus crucified and risen when and where it pleases Him. Faith is
not created by human enthusiasm, crusades for social justice, or
2019 Convention Workbook

strategic planning. Faith comes through the Word of the cross.
That’s what Lutheran mission is given to proclaim. It is precisely
in this Lutheran understanding of mission that mercy and life
together converge.
Lutheran mission celebrates First Article gifts of language and
culture. Lutheran mission has no interest in changing the culture
of a people as long as those conventions and culture are not sinful. In fact, Lutheran mission, as found in the Reformation, seeks
to bring the Gospel to people in their native language. Lutheran
mission teaches that Christian churches are to be subject to the
governing authorities and do not engage in revolution. Lutheran
mission seeks to build capacity in the newly planted churches so
that, in the unity of faith and confession, these younger churches
may mature and live as true partners together with us in Witness,
Mercy, Life Together.
13. Word of God. The triune God is a speaking God. By His
spoken Word, the Father brought creation into existence (Gen.
1:1–2; Ps. 33:6; John 1:1–3). Christ, who is the eternal Logos,
speaks His words, which are “spirit and life” (John 6:63). The
Word of Christ’s death and resurrection—the message of God’s
reconciliation of sinners to Himself—is preached. It is this
preaching that creates faith, since “faith comes from hearing and
hearing through the word of Christ” (Rom. 10:17). The Holy
Spirit breathed out by Jesus to His apostles on Easter evening
(see John 20:22) inspired them to put His Word into writing “so
that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and
that believing you may have life in His name” (John 20:31). It is
through the prophetic and apostolic witness to Christ delivered to
us in the Holy Scriptures—the Spirit-inspired and inerrant Word
of God—that we have access to Jesus and life with Him (see 2 Tim.
3:15 and 2 Pet. 1:16–21). The Holy Scriptures are to be interpreted
in light of their being given by the triune God. “The exegesis of
the Holy Scriptures cannot contradict their inspiration.”13 Both
interpreter and context stand under the Holy Scriptures and are,
in fact, interpreted by the divine Word. The internal clarity of
Scripture is mediated through the external clarity of its own words.
Far from being an imposition on the Bible, the right distinction
of the Law from the Gospel is nothing other than the distinction
between “letter” and “Spirit” (see 2 Cor. 3:1–18). Without this
distinction, the Holy Scriptures remain a dark book (see Ap IV
5–6; FC V 1–27).
The Scriptures stand in the service of preaching. Preaching
that conforms to the prophetic and apostolic Scriptures is the oral
Word of God and, therefore, a Means of Grace. Preaching is never
merely descriptive but always a kerygmatic, efficacious proclamation that delivers condemnation to secure sinners and consolation
to those broken by their sin. Preaching is always a speaking of
either the Law or the Gospel in the present tense, creating repentance and faith in those who hear where and when it pleases God
(see Is. 55:10–11; AC V 2–3).
Preaching is not limited to the sermon but is also individualized in the absolution, where God’s servant is entrusted to speak
words that forgive sins now (see John 20:21–23; SC V). The absolution is eschatological, that is, it brings the verdict of the Last Day
into time as Christ says, “I forgive you your sins.” The absolution
leaves no room for doubt, for it is God’s own Word of promise to
be trusted in life and death.
14. Baptism. Baptism is far more than a rite of initiation. While
it is a line of demarcation between unbelief and faith, and hence
not optional for mission, it is more than an entry point into the