LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2004, Page 450

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10. Among the possible options for “the false prophets” are the
Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, Zealots, Simon Magus, Bar Kokba,
Gnostics and legalistic Jewish Christians. Absence of a specific
group may indicate that a variety of false teachers had already
plagued the early Christian community. See W. D. Davies and Dale
C. Allison, Jr., The Gospel According to Saint Matthew, The Inter-
national Critical Commentary, 3 vols. (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark,
1988-1998), 1:701-2.

11. Allan Bloom, The Closing of the American Mind (New
York: Simon and Schuster, 1987), 25.

12. “The fundamental error, which equates the revelation with
revealed doctrine begins with the Apologists but has its beginnings
even in the Pastoral Epistles and with the Apostolic Fathers (cf.
Titus 2:10, and the emphasis on ‘sound doctrine’). The expression
in 2 Tim. 3:16, ‘Every scripture inspired of God is also profitable
for teaching,’ which, wrongly translated, became the locus classi-
cus [classic proof-text] for the doctrine of verbal inspiration, be-
trays the beginnings of this unfortunate identification.’” Emil Brun-
ner, Revelation and Reason, tr. Olive Wyon (Philadelphia:
Westminster Press, 1946), 8-9, notes 12 and 13.

13. See also John 1:17, 18; 6:63, 68; 8:31—32; 2 Cor. 3:64:18;
Gal.3:2-5; 1 Peter 1:23-25.

14. Luther wrote: “For the sectarians who deny the bodily pres-
ence of Christ in the Lord’s Supper accuse us today of being quar-
relsome, harsh, and intractable, because, as they say, we shatter
love and harmony among the churches on account of this single
doctrine about the Sacrament.... To this argument of theirs we
reply with Paul: ‘A little yeast leavens the whole lump.’ In philos-
ophy a tiny error in the beginning is very great at the end. Thus in
theology a tiny error overthrows the whole teaching. Therefore
doctrine and life should be distinguished as sharply as possible.
Doctrine belongs to God, not to us; and we are called only as its
ministers. Therefore we cannot give up or change even one dot of it
(Matt. 5:18). Life belongs to us; ...For doctrine is like a mathe-
matical point. Therefore it cannot be divided; that is, it cannot stand
either subtraction or addition. On the other hand, life is like a phys-
ical point. Therefore it can always be divided and can always yield
something.... We are surely prepared to observe peace and love
with all men, provided that they leave the doctrine of faith perfect
and sound for us. If we cannot obtain this, it is useless for them to
demand love from us. A curse on a love that is observed at the ex-
pense of the doctrine of faith, to which everything must yield—
love, an apostle, an ange] from heaven, etc.!... Therefore let us
leave the praise of harmony and of Christian love to them. We, on
the other hand, praise faith and the majesty of the Word. Love can
sometimes be neglected without danger, but the Word and faith
cannot. It belongs to love to bear everything and to yield to every-
one. On the other hand, it belongs to faith to bear nothing whatever
and to yield to no one.... In the issue of salvation...when fanatics
teach lies and errors under the guise of truth and make an impres-
sion on many, there love is certainly not to be exercised, and error
is not to be approved. For what is lost here is not merely a good
deed done for someone who is unthankful, but the Word, faith,
Christ, and eternal life. Therefore if you deny God in one article of
faith, you have denied Him in all; for God is not divided into many
articles of faith, but He is everything in each article and He is one
in all the articles of faith. Therefore when the Sacramentarians ac-
cuse us of neglecting love, we continually reply to them with this
proverb of Paul’s: ‘A little yeast, etc.’ [Gal.5:9].” Martin Luther,
“Lectures on Galatians” (1535), Luther’s Works (hereafter LW),
American Edition (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1964),
27:36-39.

15. “The fellowship is not brought about by the actions of bless-
ing and breaking, but by the content of the cup and the bread: ‘For

2004 Convention Workbook

one bread (it is), one body we are, the many, for we all partake of
one bread’ (v17).” Hermann Sasse, “Sanctorum Communio,” in
This Is My Body, 355.

16. “We are perfectly willing for the Mass to be understood as a
daily sacrifice, provided this means the whole Mass, the ceremony
and also the proclamation of the Gospel, faith, prayer, and thanks-
giving. Taken together, these are the daily sacrifice of the New Tes-
tament; the ceremony was instituted because of them [German
adds: “it was instituted for the sake of preaching” and ought not be
separated from them. Therefore St. Paul says (I Cor. 11:26), ‘As
often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the
Lord’s death.’” Ap XXIV, 35; Tappert 256.

17. The Lord’s Supper is the Church’s Supper—not the supper
of private individuals (see | Cor. 11:20-22). “The ‘either-or’ of
Lord’s Supper or Church’s Supper presupposes a certain degenera-
tion... . this can consist in seeing in the Lord’s Supper solely a gift
of Christ to the individual, giving an individualistic misinterpreta-
tion.” Edmund Schlink, “Lord’s Supper or Church’s Supper,” in
Intercommunion, Donald Ballie and John Marsh, eds., (London:
SCM, 1952), 298. The Lord’s Supper is not the property of the in-
dividual Christian. It is not the Christian’s feelings, thoughts, opin-
ions, views, or even theology, which decides what the Lord’s Sup-
per is. Such misunderstandings come from Schleiermacher’s view
of the church (see Elert, Eucharist and Church Fellowship, 2).
Charles Porterfield Krauth expressed it well: “Christ is the centre of
the [Evangelical] system, and in the Supper is the centre of Christ’s
revelation of Himself. The glory and mystery of the incarnation
combine there as they combine nowhere else. Communion with
Christ is that by which we live, and the Supper is ‘the Commu-
nion.’” The Conservative Reformation and Its Theology (Min-
neapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1963), 655.

18. “Surely one must see that the true counterpart in our day to
the false teachers of the New Testament age are the heterodox
church-bodies themselves. ... For in them heterodoxy, false teach-
ing, is given a habitation and a name; it is given respectability; it is
given perpetuity—and all this under the protection of the blessed
name ‘Church’! The false teachings given refuge in heterodox bod-
ies are every bit as bad as the false teachings known in the New
Testament.... And in all heterodox bodies it is just their character-
istic false teaching that makes them what they are, and that is their
raison d’etre [“reason for existence”]. In as far as they are what
their reason for existence is, they are the modern counterparts of
the New Testament false teachers and false prophets. And the New
Testament condemnation of false teachers should be applied to
them directly and without any softening of the rebuke.” H. P.
Hamann, cited in Crossroads, A Report by the Parish Education
Committee of the Queensland District, Evangelical Lutheran
Church of Australia, 1965, 49-50.

19. I. Howard Marshall who does not believe that the bread is
Christ’s body agrees that “avoiding” means refusing them the
Lord’s Supper. He states: “[I]f 1 Corinthians was meant to be read
as part of the proceedings at the church meal, the use of the curse
against those who do not love the Lord (1 Cor. 16:21) may be seen
as reinforcing the sense of community among those who in the
meal confessed their love of the Lord and their separation from oth-
ers, specifically those who proclaimed another gospel (cf. the sim-
ilarly placed warning in Rom. 16:17—18 and also Gal. 1:8-9 for the
use of the curse).” “Lord’s Supper,” in Dictionary of Paul and His
Letters, Gerald F. Hawthorne and Ralph P. Martin, eds. (Downers
Grove, IL and Leicester, England: InterVarsity Press, 1993), 573.

20. Elert concludes: “The separation from false teachers which
we find in the epistles (already Rom. 16:17),...obviously applies
in the first place to the divine service which includes the Eu-
charist.” Eucharist and Church Fellowship, 114.