Synodical Conference Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 1954, Page 94

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94 Proceedings of the Forty-Third Convention,

pray jointly without giving the impression that they are united
in faith.”

Above we have just shown that prayers at intersynodical
conferences, prayers for the Spirit’s help to remove the barriers of
error so we can have church fellowship, cannot be classified as a
practice of church fellowship. For more than five years I have
taken part in such free conferences, and in our area not one case
can be cited where the impression was left that joint prayers at
these conferences meant that we were completely united in church
fellowship. In fact, the very opposite was brought out again and
again. The same holds for Synod as such. Those two objections
against joint prayer listed in the Wisconsin Synod tract are sub-
jective, are not Scripture-based. Therefore they are not conscience-
binding.

Neither is the reference to Matt. 18:19 conscierice-binding as
to the point made in Tract 10 (p. 4). “God’s Word takes for granted
that we agree with each other whenever we pray together.” Matt.
18:19 simply says: “If two of you shall agree on earth as touching
anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of My
Father in heaven.” The agreement referred to is concerning the
things to be asked for, not to an agreement in faith.

“Negotiating with Lodges and Boy Scouts of America with
the Plea that This Gives Opportunity to Witness” (4)

Our answer to that objection is found in Another Fraternal
Endeavor, pp. 80—82. Just let me add a few remarks. In Missouri
Synod’s so-called “negotiating” with deistic societies no spiritual
fellowship is involved. Therefore the application of “avoid them”
and other similar warning is impossible.

What is this so-called negotiating? It is witnessing for Christ
against the lodges’ spiritual fellowship based on worship of a com-
posite God that does not exist, a worship that offers a hope of
heaven by man’s merits, and prayers without Christ. When we
told leaders of these groups, by whatever names they went, that
God in 2 Corinthians 6 had told us we dared not enter into such
a spiritual fellowship, because it would be a denial of Christ and
endanger our souls, but must come out, they wanted to know
what needed to be done to remove our objections. God says:
“Be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you
a reason of the hope that is in you” (1 Peter 3:15). We answered:
“Get rid of that kind of Christless spiritual fellowship and worship.”
When patriotic organizations were formed that were influenced
by the trend to have some kind of fellowship based on “religion,”
our Synod sought to influence leaders to eliminate those objection-
able features at once, before they were incorporated into the basic
setup of that organization. Brethren, you might well improve upon
the manner and method used by us and make suggestions there,
but you cannot deny that instead of unionism there was witnessing.
You have no Word of God to stand on which you can apply in
classifying these so-called “negotiations” as “persistent adherence
to unionistic practices.” It would be wise and brotherly to eliminate
this objection at once and so help clear the air a bit.