LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2004, Page 452

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452 OTHER PERTINENT DOCUMENTS

fess, to save, and to defend, to the glory of God.” In addition, see
IV, 400: “Although our opponents arrogate to themselves the name
of the church, therefore, we know that the church of Christ is
among those who teach the Gospel of Christ, not among those who
defend wicked opinions against the Gospel, as the Lord says, ‘My
sheep hear my voice’ (John 10:27)” (Latin text; Tappert, 168). In
speaking of one Christ, one Spirit, etc. the German version of the
Apology seems to be reflecting on Eph. 4:4—6, a position that we
have outlined in the body of the paper.

31. The German adds: “In all this [dariiber] the true doctrine
and church [rechte Lehre und Kirche] is often so utterly oppressed
and lost, as happened under the papacy, as though there were no
church, and it often appears as though she had quite perished”(Ap
VII/VIII, 9). Reformed theology uses “‘visible church” of those as-
sociations that are committed to God’s ordinances. The “invisible
church” are those individuals who are elected and called directly
by the Holy Spirit and not through the means of grace. Thus, for
the Reformed the invisible and visible churches are really two sep-
arate churches and not one church with two different aspects as in
Lutheran theology.

32. German: “[T]his self-same church has these external signs:
the office of preaching [Predigtamr] or Gospel and the sacraments”
(Ap VII/VIIL, 22).

33. “For this is sufficient for the true unity of the Christian
church, that the Gospel be harmoniously preached there according
to [its] pure understanding, and that the sacraments be administered
in accordance with the divine Word. And it is not necessary for the
true unity of the Christian church that uniform ceremonies, insti-
tuted by men, be everywhere observed, as Paul says to the Ephe-
sians in chapter 4: ‘One body, one Spirit, as also you are called to
one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one Baptism’” (VII,
2-3; our translation of the German).

34. Luther dubbed this “‘collier’s faith” (a blind faith in “what
the church believes” without knowing what that is). “An Open Let-
ter to Those in Frankfurt on the Main, 1533,” trans. Jon D. Vieker,
Concordia Journal 16 (October 1990) 339. See also F. Pieper,
Christian Dogmatics, 3:429.

35. In the Large Catechism, Luther goes further. He writes:
“See, then, what a great need there is for this kind of prayer! Since
we see that the world is full of sects and false teachers, all of whom
wear the holy name as a cloak and warrant for their devilish doc-
trine, we ought constantly to cry out against all who preach and be-
lieve falsely and against those who attack and persecute our Gospel
and pure doctrine and try to suppress it, as the bishops, tyrants, fa-
natics, and others do.... For there is nothing [God] would rather
hear than to have his glory and praise exalted above everything else
and his Word taught in its purity and cherished and treasured” (LC
Ill, 47-48; Tappert 426).

36. The alternative is “enthusiasm” or “spiritualizing,” else-
where called “fanaticism” [Schwarmerei]: “All this is the old devil
and the old serpent who made enthusiasts of Adam and Eve. He
led them from the external Word of God to spiritualizing and to
their own imaginations.... It is a poison implanted and inoculated
in man by the old dragon, and it is the source, strength, and power
of all heresy, including that of the papacy and Mohammedanism”
(SA III, viii, 5, 9; Tappert 312-13).

37. Regarding the Augsburg Confession, its Apology, the Smal-
cald Articles (including the Treatise), and the two Catechisms, the
Formula confesses: “The pure churches and schools have every-
where recognized these publicly and generally accepted documents
as the sum and pattern of the doctrine which Dr. Luther of blessed
memory clearly set forth in his writings on the basis of God’s Word
and conclusively established against the papacy and other sects”

2004 Convention Workbook

(FC SD, Rule and Norm, 9; Tappert, 505). The decree of Nicea,
which forms the basis for our Nicene Creed, did not have the
lengthy article on the Holy Spirit that was added later in 381 at
Constantinople. Rather, it condemned several phrases which the
Arians had used to show that the Son was not God in the same
sense as was the Father.

38. “We should forsake wicked teachers because they no longer
function in the place of Christ, but are antichrists. Christ says (Matt.
7:15), ‘Beware of false prophets’; Paul says (Gal. 1:9), ‘If anyone is
preaching to you a gospel contrary to that which you received, let
him be accursed’” (Ap VII/VIII, 48; Tappert, 177). “Most of what
our opponents maintain, on the other hand, does overthrow faith,
as when they condemn our doctrine that forgiveness of sins is re-
ceived by faith” (21; Tappert, 172).

39. “To dissent from the consensus of so many nations and to be
called schismatics is a serious matter. But divine authority com-
mands us all not to be associated with and not to support impiety
and unjust cruelty” (Treatise, 42; Tappert, 328). “The errors of the
pope are manifest, and they are not trifling.... And it is the clear
command of God that we should flee from idolatry, impious doc-
trines, and unjust cruelty.... On the other hand, those who agree
with the pope and defend his doctrines and forms of worship de-
file themselves with idolatry and blasphemous opinions...detract
from the glory of God, and hinder the welfare of the church by so
strengthening errors and other crimes as to impose them on all pos-
terity” (58, 59; Tappert, 330).

40. A classic commentary on this passage is given in the Mem-
orandum [Darlegung] of 1871, which stated the reasons for form-
ing the Lutheran Synodical Conference of North America: “...so
that our little Lutheran Zion is by no means that church . . . outside
of which there would be no salvation.... But the question whether
true believers and children of God exist also outside the Lutheran
church, and the question whether one may cultivate pulpit and altar
fellowship with members of a heterodox communion, are quite dif-
ferent, so that our church just as resolutely answers the second
question with a No as she answers the first with a Yes.... Our
church is indeed far from condemning [verdammen], for example,
all Reformed, who still err in the article of the Holy Supper, or all
Baptists, who still err in the doctrine of infant Baptism, or all
Methodists, who still err in the doctrine of the signs of the state of
grace; but our church is just as far from admitting a Reformed, a
Baptist, a Methodist to its altar, let alone a Reformed, Baptist, or
Methodist preacher into her pulpit, without having first ‘reminded,
instructed, warned’ and prevailed upon them to ‘turn to the infalli-
ble truth of the divine Word and unite with us and our churches
and schools.’ Rather, our church declares that in the contrary case
‘one blind person would let himself be misled by another.’” Pro-
ceedings Ev. Lutheran Synodical Conference of North America, |
(1871-92), 24-25.

41. “As soon as a congregation no longer wishes to recognize
the deciding authority of the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical
Lutheran Church, it ceases to be a Lutheran congregation; but if it
does not wish to subject itself even to the clear statements of Holy
Scripture, as the Word of the eternal God, it becomes a school of
Satan. Rev. 3, 9.” C.F.W. Walther, Die Rechte Gestalt [The Right
Form of an Evangelical Lutheran Congregation Independent of the
State] (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1890); 62 (our
translation; emphases in original).

42. This study must take note of the recent alliances that involve
the majority of the world’s Lutheran churches and Reformed and
Episcopal churches. These agreements rested on those critical
methods of biblical research that erroneously find different, com-
peting theologies within the New Testament. In 1981 the LCMS
took official notice of an essay that had argued “that the whole tra-