LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2004, Page 205

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THEOLOGY AND CHURCH RELATIONS 205

Admittedly, the Holy Spirit does at times use events in the
life of unconverted people to prepare them for the Gospel. How-
ever, such crises are applications of the Law. As such they may
break down the resistance of the unconverted in the sense that
they cause that person to become aware of the fact that he or she
has sinned against God, deserves His wrath and punishment, and
asks, “What must I do to be saved?” But in the strict sense, the
individual stops resisting and becomes receptive to the Gospel
only at the time of conversion (ECG, p. 38, emphasis added).

Can we determine the receptivity of the individual or not? ECG
clearly says no, but the CTCR’s Review claims that it says yes.
“Soil-testing” has no legitimacy in the Scriptures or Confessions.®
Efforts to diagnose the “receptivity” to the Gospel of certain people
in comparison to others can easily start one on the path toward syn-
ergism.

As a theological study document, FSCC is integrated and con-
sistent. In contrast, the CTCR’s Review of FSCC presents two con-
tradictory messages. On the one hand, it encourages the search out-
side Lutheran theology for principles, methods, and resources
because this may achieve more “God-pleasing” diversity in wor-
ship and measurable increases in growth. “At the same time,” on
the other hand, the Commission insistently urges the Synod to con-
sult its own documents when it has looked beyond the CTCR for
theological guidance.

The CTCR cannot have it both ways. The central issue here
seems to be the freedom of those in our Synod to seek and employ
theological guidance from elsewhere. The CTCR’s Review en-
courages Church Growth practitioners to look outside the Synod.
How can it be any less appropriate to look beyond the CTCR for
theological guidance within the Synod?

The CTCR’s Review has nonetheless performed a useful ser-
vice for the Synod. It has repeatedly highlighted apparent tensions
between its own documents—Evangelism and Church Growth
from 1987, in particular—and the 2001 Report of the Church
Growth Study Committee. For the Sake of Christ’s Commission
can be used along with other recent writings on the CGM’ to as-
certain whether outright contradictions can be found within these
tensions.

Since the CTCR released ECG in September 1987, the Church
Growth Movement has itself grown, moved, and mutated, and its
practitioners have provided their own critical reassessments.
George Barna, a noted observer of Church Growth trends and sta-
tistics, questioned the effectiveness of CG methods as he looked
back over the ’90s:

Claims of prolific church growth have been grossly exag-
gerated; not only are most churches not increasing in size, but
those that are expanding are doing so at the expense of other
churches. More than 80 percent of the adults who get counted
as new adherents and thus are part of the growth statistic are re-
ally just transplants from other churches—teligious consumers
in search of the perfect, or at least more exciting or enjoyable,
church experience. Disturbingly little church growth is attribut-
able to new converts. All in all, it was not a good decade for

. church growth.®

Another non-Lutheran Church Growth pastor makes a similar con-
fession:

Clearly at the inception of the church growth movement the
focus was to evangelize the lost. Unfortunately along the way,
as growth principles were laid in place, the greatest growth was
generated consistently through transfer growth. ... The great
press for the evangelization of the world has been detoured as
the church’s primary occupation has become seeking the sheep
that are wayfarers of a neighboring sheepfold. This redirecting
of the church’s evangelistic energy may be the single most neg-
ative facet of transfer growth.”

Discretion in the use of Church Growth methods among LCMS
congregations needs to be heightened and strengthened, not dimin-
ished or dismissed. Let us heed this counsel from our Synod’s first
President, Dr. C. F. W. Walther:

Furthermore, a Synod that is “faithful to the Confessions”
must also “supervise the confessional faithfulness of its mem-
bers.” It is therefore not enough that a Synod, so to speak, have
only the official statement, “A Synod true to the Confessions,

adhering without reservation to all the Symbols (confessional
statements).” It is not enough that it receive only such pastors
and teachers as prove themselves faithful to the Confessions. /f
must also see to it that they remain that way, for only “he that is
faithful to the end shall be saved” (Matt. 10:22).

But it is impossible for a sizable church body to remain in
the true faith if there isn’t a constant check to see that every-
thing still is as it was in the beginning, when the pastor came to
the congregation. Without visitation it is probably impossible
for a church to remain in unity of faith and confession (empha-
sis added).'°

The children of Missouri are struggling against one another
within her womb. May the God of Isaac, Rebekah, and Jacob also
guide The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod as she seeks to re-
solve her inner rivalries in order to boldly bear His promises in our
lost and dying culture.

Notes

|. As a recent advertisement for a Christian college reminds us: “If
you want to change the surrounding culture, it helps to have one
of your own.”

2. The CTCR’s review of FSCC employs the page numbers found
in the 2001 Convention Workbook. FSCC has previously been
accessible through the Office of the President’s portion of the
official LCMS Web site. A notice indicates that this document
may no longer be available from the LCMS Web site after
March 31. FSCC can also be found online at
http://people.csp.edu/ mueller/ CSP/THY281/ForTheSake-
OfTheChurch.doc http://www.ctsfw. edu/library/files/er/480.

3. Concerning our freedom in Christ, Paul wrote: “For you were
called to freedom, brethren; only do not turn your freedom into
an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another”
(Gal. 5:13). Lutheran Christians certainly construct their wor-
ship services on the basis of the Word alone (“formal principal”),
yet that form always accentuates the “material principal” of the
Gospel: justification by grace through faith in Jesus Christ alone.
We apprehend God’s grace in Christ only through the means He
Himself has given: Word and Sacrament. That is why the
Lutheran church has followed the greater part of Christendom in
extolling those means through a regular pattern of consensual
worship called the liturgy. Baptists may share with us the “for-
mal principle,” yet their “material principle” centers not on the
Gospel, but on the believer’s unfettered liberty of conscience in
religious matters. The CTCR’s Review speaks of the “freedom
granted to the church ... in worship forms ... so long as this di-
versity does not compromise or undermine God’s Word.” If ex-
ercising that freedom focuses upon anything other than the
Gospel in Word and Sacrament, it cannot be called genuinely
Lutheran (which is to say, thoroughly Christian).

4. The Synod’s 1998 convention adopted Res. 2-10, “To Build
Consensus on Worship.” It presents a practical approach to re-
solving these tensions in our Synod, which need not distort our
assessment or use of FSCC. That resolution’s final clause quotes
Martin Luther’s letter to the Christians in Livonia: “I pray all of
you, my dear sirs, let each one surrender his own opinions and
get together in a friendly way and come to a common decision
about these external matters, so that there will be one uniform
practice throughout your district instead of disorder.”

5. The statements below, taken from the CTCR’s Review, also
support this conclusion:

« “Tt is the opinion of the CTCR that its ... reports ... can continue to be
of service to the church in affirming many of the valid warnings of
FSCC while at the same time offering some insight into how certain
emphases of the church growth movement might be acknowledged
and adapted in ways that are consistent with Lutheran theology” (p.
2).

« “The question raised in a pointed way by church growth proponents
merits serious consideration also by confessional Lutherans: ‘Is the
church today using every legitimate modern technique which God has
made available in an effort to meet its mission challenge?’ (ECG,
39)” (p. 4).