LCMS Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 1973, Page 94

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CLOSING COMMENTS

Ir I MAY HAVE YOUR ATTENTION, PLEASE, BRETHREN:

Perhaps this is not a very good time to talk, but
we are going home. We are going home with some
very mixed feelings. We are going home after a very
strenuous period which for all of us lasted nearly a
week and for some of us has been a period of 2 weeks.

I feel that I’d like to say a few things to you, both
to the lay delegates and to the pastoral and teacher
delegates. What you have seen at this convention is
what those of us who have been involved in the synod-
ical administration have lived with almost every day.
We have had a serious problem, involved with a great
deal of distrust, a great deal of lack of confidence. We
have indulged in all kinds of activities just as we have
here, for which undoubtedly when we go home at night
we will say, “Please, dear God, help me.” And I say
that in no judgment of any of you. I say it in judgment
of myself and leave you to judge yourselves.

But the fact remains that we are still members of
The Lutheran Church — Missouri Synod. We are still
united in an organizational membership, and I am con-
vinced we are also united in a deeper bond of faith
than perhaps our antics would indicate.

(Applause).

Please, I’m not through yet; I have a few more
things to say. I hope you will give me the indulgence.

I come back to what Vice-President Merkens said
to you so long, long ago, in the opening service last
Friday night when he spoke about the church and that
farmer who wanted to sell his farm, and he said many
other things which illustrated the same thing. One man
came to me today. He has, I must admit, not been one
of the members of my fan club. He said, “I have never
seen one pastoral action from you.” I would like him to
see one now, and I hope he is here.

We are going home to our congregations, to our cir-
cuits, our parishes, our various callings, and I hope that
we will go home not just to gird for further hassling
and division but that we will go home remembering
why we are here — to preach our Lord Jesus Christ and
to do His will.

I would like to share with you my dilemma, and in
many ways it, as has been demonstrated here, is your
dilemma and the dilemma of every member of our
church. We are caught between the desire on the one
hand to be as faithful as we possibly can to the Word
of our gracious and loving God. On the other hand, we
want to be pastoral in our dealings with one another
and with everyone. This creates a tension. And I want

to say to you who have elected me under conditions
that would lead anyone to believe he couldn't get elected
to anything: Either you are unspeakably credulous or
unspeakably charitable, I don’t know which. But you
have done so, and I want to pledge you this. (This is
not a prepared speech. I didn’t sit up all night preparing
it with anybody; it just came to me with both the joys
of this convention and the sorrows and the humiliations
and the anguish of it, and, I know, the anguish of every-
one here. Don’t think you are the only one who suffers
—-we all do, and the church does.) And I want to
pledge to you that I will do my duty as set forth in the
Constitution of the Synod as faithfully as I know how.
I want this church of ours to be a Biblical and con-
fessional Lutheran church. On the other hand, I pledge
you that I will do my duty as evangelically and pas-
torally and lovingly and kindly as God the Holy Spirit
gives me the wisdom and understanding to perform it.
That is my intention and, in a way, it is yours also.

So let us understand each other; let us be sympa-
thetic and kind and helpful to one another. But remem-
ber that every one of us worships the same God, who
has revealed Himself to us in the same Scripture and
who asks each of us to be faithful to it, and to the Lord,
who is the heart and soul and center of that Scripture.
And let us in our dealings in the months that lie ahead,
both lay and clergy, be pastoral, by which I think we
all mean: kind and loving and charitable and forgiving
as much as we possibly can in the ways that God has
outlined for us in His holy Word.

I want to wish you all a most blessed trip home.
It’s like every convention, an opportunity to meet the
people of the church, people you will never see again,
people you have come to love, and perhaps in some
cases to have other feelings toward, but I hope they will
always be feelings of forgiveness.

I want to thank everyone, all of you, for all you
have done to help this convention, for all that you have
done to help the church make at least some plans, some
progress, and some decisions for the years that lie
ahead.

It’s not the easiest time for our church, and yet we
have such wonderful things to offer the world. Let us
be faithful to what we have, diligent and willing in
spreading it, and loving in dealing with one another.

May God bless you! Now, the orders of the day.

(Applause)

Thank you. Thank you also for that very great
kindness that you showed Mrs. Preus.

J. A. O, Preus