Synodical Conference Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 1958, Page 37

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Lutheran Synodical Conference, 1958 - 87

the same doctrine of the Gospel and the same doctrine of the
Sacraments, stand above their differences of opinion on pacifism
and above the frictions that will always be a part of life even
among Christians?

Whatever the answers to these two questions and whatever
the actions of the two groups — whether they break or remain
united — I think we would all be inclined to pray that God might
bless them both, that He might let both continue to labor in His
vineyard in their own way, and that eventually He would let
them realize that they are really working together, to quote Robert
Frost (in “The Tuft of Flowers”), “whether they work together
or apart.”

Before I close, I should like to offer for your consideration
another hypothetical case. I go to the missionary field this time
because that has from the very beginning been the peculiar sphere
of the Synodical Conference. In skimming over the pages of Chris-
tian missionary history, I was struck by the fact that in the centuries
following the year 600 or thereabouts the church often grew in
spurts as the result of mass conversions rather than of individual
soul winning. Unfortunately that was as true of Mohammedanism
as of Christianity. The most important task of the missionary in
those times, it seems, was to gain the ear of a king or queen or
chief priest and impress him by some dramatic performance.
Thus Boniface, the Apostle of Germany, dealt heathenism a final
blow in that country by destroying the sacred oak of Thor at
Geismar with impunity, and Wilfrid of York won the Frisians for
Christianity because during the winter he spent with them the
catch of fish on which they heavily relied for a livelihood was
better than normal.

Even so, a long time passed before all of Europe was within
the Christian fold. The Finns came in just before 1300; the Lithu-
anians just before 1400. Those of you who are impatient with our
missionary work in Asia or Africa might ponder this fact for
a while: it took nearly 1400 years to make all of Europe Christian.
Protestants have been in Asia and Africa perhaps 250 years.
We may have a thousand more to go.

I should like to point out one other fact. But for mass con-
versions, we might not be Lutherans or even Christians today. Our
Germanic forefathers a thousand years ago seem to have been
brought into the Christian fold in most cases by mass conversions.
Half a millennium later they became Lutherans in a similar way.
To be sure, thousands did espouse reformed doctrines on their own
initiative, but more thousands adopted them by command of a
prince. When the prince was converted, his people followed suit.
If he did not, they stayed. Cuius regio, eius religio was the prin-
ciple of the time. .

Now when we look at missions today, especially those of the
Lutheran-or Protestant churches, we notice that they operate on
a principle almost exactly opposite. Our work usually begins with
the submerged, the poor, the untouchables. Our standards of
admission into the church in the mission field are comparatively
high. A period of thorough instruction is taken for granted before
Baptism is administered. Furthermore, our appeal is almost
exclusively to individuals. We would hardly countenance such
practices as those followed by Spanish missionaries in Latin