LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2023, Page 292

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292

THEOLOGY AND CHURCH RELATIONS

to what he has learned from the Catechism and whether he is
willing to abandon the sins which he has done to the contrary.
(Warnungsschrift an die zu Frankfurt a. M., sich vor
Zwinglischer Lehre und Lehren zu Huten. Luther’s Works, St.
Louis Ed., 17:2018.)
(Matthew C. Harrison, John T. Pless, Closed Communion?
Admission to the Lord’s Supper in Biblical Lutheran Perspective
[St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 2017]); and
WHEREAS, The danger is real, the practice of open Communion
unloving; for danger extends both to faithful LCMS congregational
members and to those Christians visiting from outside our Synod
fellowship when the practice of closed Communion is not observed
and those uninstructed and unexamined are welcomed to the Lord’s
altar (Carl Fickenscher II, “Church Fellowship and Telling the
Good News about Jesus,” Closed Communion, 2001, 253; Ernie
Lassman, “1 Corinthians 11:29—‘Discerning the Body’ and its
Implications for Close(d) Communion,” Logia, 1994, 333–39); and
WHEREAS, It is our goal as those who “walk together” not only
“that all pastors and members of the LCMS recognize the Scriptural
and practical necessity of adhering publicly to both a professed and
functional closed Communion practice” (2019 Proceedings, 145;
emphasis added), but that all pastors and officers of Synod indeed
do so publicly adhere; and
WHEREAS, Our Lord has given our Synod a fourth year between
conventions, that any and all members of Synod as pastors, and
especially as district presidents who shall “cause the resolutions of
Synod to be implemented” (Bylaw 4.4.2 [a]) and Circuit Visitors all
of whom are expected to be “conversant with and supportive of” the
Synod’s resolutions (Bylaw 5.2.3 [e]), “might study God’s Word
and the Lutheran Confessions … with an eye to teaching and
upholding our confession and practice regarding the administration
of the Lord’s Supper” (2019 Proceedings, 145); and
WHEREAS, The lackluster practice of open Communion these
past 50+ years within the Synod, which practice necessarily teaches
a pastor’s congregants that there is neither danger nor serious
difference in the teachings of Reformed, Baptist, Roman Catholic,
Methodist, Greek Orthodox, Evangelical Lutheran Church in
America, and other church bodies on the matter of our Lord Jesus’
last will and testament in His institution of the Last Supper, or in
other matters of doctrine and practice, has turned our Synod into a
lukewarm religious body and, no doubt, has contributed to the
losses within our Synod; and
WHEREAS, The practice of open Communion is a sin against
Jesus Christ and “the new Covenant in His blood,” which sin surely
compares to, if not exceeds, sins against the Lord’s covenant with
Israel in the Old Testament, one of which being that of Achan,
regarding banned goods at Jericho, as Adolph Harstad describes in
his commentary:
Achan’s act removed a condition of the sacred contract and sent
covenant blessings and Israelite blood spilling to the ground. His
radical disobedience was like kicking a leg out from under a
banquet table and destroying the feast for all…The sin of the one
man Achan poisons the whole nation … (Adolph Harstad,
Joshua, [St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 2004], 304).
How many LCMS pastors today open the table to uninstructed and
unexamined participants? More than one. In some circuits, in some
districts, well over half.

2023 Convention Workbook

Then Joshua ripped to pieces his clothes and fell on His face to
the ground before the ark of the Lord. Then the Lord said to
Joshua: “Get yourself up! Why this, you falling on your face?
Israel sinned. Yes, they have transgressed my covenant which I
commanded them …” (Joshua 7:6, 10–11; Harstad translation,
308, emphasis added).
Only one out of all the host of Israel’s fighting men sinned, and yet
the Lord holds all of them accountable. “The plural pronoun ‘they’
again shows that the Lord holds all Israel guilty. He is not satisfied
that almost all the Israelites have honored the covenant conditions.”
Jesus has entrusted the new covenant in His blood to His Church,
and has made those He has sent to be “stewards of the mysteries of
God.” By God’s grace both the Supper’s right practice, instruction
regarding its blessings, and defense against error were a major part
of the Lutheran Reformation and continue to be a lasting treasure
uniquely safe-guarded in the public confession of the Evangelical
Lutheran Church, in which confession the LCMS joins and is a part
(if before God her practice will allow it).
Harstad writes, “… Achan had committed the one sin that is both a
transgression of the covenant and a sacrilege.” In what category was
that sin? “It denotes a violation of moral and spiritual values that is
outrageously offensive and disgraceful” (Harstad, 313–14). And
how can we judge the sin of open Communion, in which pastors not
only allow uninstructed Christians to partake of the Lord’s body to
their judgment (Gr. krima), but in many cases invite the
uninstructed and unexamined to come; and
WHEREAS, It is time—having given years and years for study,
Koinonia, consideration, and reconsideration of our Synod’s closed
Communion position in the light of the Holy Scriptures and the
Lutheran Confessions; therefore be it
Resolved, That in the fear of the Lord, who by His shed blood
poured out for us in the Holy Supper forgives our sins, all LCMS
pastors (re)commit to a careful, principled administration of the
Sacrament of the Altar in love for the instructed and for the
uninstructed, and, because all share in the sin of even one, with
repentant hearts amend their ways and walk uprightly, knowing that
“all things are naked and laid bare to the eyes of him to whom we
must give account” (Heb. 4:13; verse quoted by Harstad, 316); and
be it further
Resolved, That those exercising ecclesiastical authority among
us oversee the pastors under their supervision that their practice be
in keeping with our Synod’s oft stated position of closed
Communion and that they refrain from communing any from
outside our fellowship until and unless they are instructed and
examined and renounce their former error and separate themselves
from the erring church body of which they are a part, with the prayer
that no pastors or leaders harden themselves against this godly
practice; and be it further
Resolved, That for the sake of unity and in keeping with Synod
Bylaw 5.2.3 (e) all circuit visitors demonstrate by their conformity
to the synodwide resolutions on closed Communion that they are
“conversant with and supportive of” these resolutions to the glory
of Christ’s name and the good of His Church; and be it finally
Resolved, That the Synod President with the Council of
Presidents and both of Synod’s seminary faculties begin an
immediate re-evaluation of the specific language of earlier
Communion resolutions regarding “emergency” situations and
“extra-ordinary” circumstances (esp. 1967 Res. 2-19, “To Take a
Position with Reference to Communing Lutherans of Other