# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1851 02 04_S95
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

95

Beza 11) answer: Neither all, nor even some children are in fact born again at the moment of Baptism, but the benefit of regeneration follows in children, through the hearing of the Word, only at their time appointed by God after the act of Baptism; and with Piscator: 12) Not even of the elect is it true that God made His covenant in circumcision itself with them. — Or to the use of the holy Supper, which was instituted for the strengthening of faith? But from that they have indeed long since banished the sacramental communion of the body and blood of Christ, and left only a presence in a certain relation and by way of likeness, that is, a presence of the body of Christ far absent. — Or to the good will of our Mediator Christ? But He, they teach, is present with us only according to His divine nature (which is a consuming fire), while a human nature, according to which He is our brother, is as far removed from us as the highest heaven from the lowest earth. — Or to the feeling of faith? But the feeling of faith often vanishes in our heart, especially in the time of temptation; the tempted man will therefore conclude: I feel no faith, therefore I have no faith, therefore God does not will that I should have faith, therefore I am in the number of the reprobate. — Or to the testimonies of faith? But whatever marks of faith may be brought forward by the adversaries, these can also be pointed out in those who have fallen from the grace of God; but these, according to the doctrine of the adversaries, never had true faith; therefore no one can be certain that he has the true faith of the elect. — Or to the office of the Word and of the sacraments? But the tempted man will answer with Beza 13): he blasphemes God Himself who believes that God ascribes even the least of His divine truth either to men through whose mouth He speaks, or to the outward Word of God itself, or to the sacramental signs, whereby men are to be renewed and preserved in Christ unto eternal life.

11) In præf. prioris respons. ad colloqu. Mompelg. p. 24.

12) In resp. ad Hoffm. p. 88. 13) Part. 2 resp. ad acta colloqu. Mompelg. pag. 116.

But if we would keep unimpaired the purity of heavenly doctrine and the support and foundation of our faith, we dare by no means dream of any sort of religious mixture, or conceal these errors as though they were slight, but must valiantly defend the truth with all our might. We, to whom it is commanded to wage the wars of the Lord, let us whet against them the sword of the Word of God, let us meet them in battle, let us stand in battle array, our loins girt about with truth, let us at the same time hold up the shield of faith, and catch the poisoned darts of their disputations, and turn them, and hurl them back upon them all the more eagerly. For these are the wars of the Lord which David and the other patriarchs waged. Let us stand against them for our brethren. It is better that I die than that any of my brethren be robbed and plundered by them, and that they, creeping in with subtle words, lead captive children and sucklings in Christ.

Joh. Gerh. ep. dedicat. ad tom. IV. loc. theol.

The False Messengers of Peace.

The old Cyriakus Spangenberg of Eisleben, Luther’s good friend, in the year 1555 published a fine little book under the title “Die Eleganzien des alten Adams oder Formularbüchlein der Alten-Adams-Sprache, der jetzigen neuen Welt sehr bräuchlich.” In it this faithful servant of Christ appraises 60 wicked proverbs then living in the mouth of the people. The 12th reads: For the sake of peace one should go a little gently.” Concerning this Spangenberg expresses himself, among other things, as follows: “One finds in the present time also among those who wish to be great theologians such as take pains so to speak and write that they may not anger or vex the opposite party, Papists, enthusiasts, and sects. What is that other than so to direct Christ’s going that He walk alongside the serpent and not tread on its head, lest it sting? Have the apostles and prophets taught or set us an example of such a thing? No, we shall surely find it otherwise in their writings and examples. But they, and whoever follows them, must be fools and simpletons to the present world; on the other hand, whoever can so manage and so frame his confession that it offends no one, he is held in all honors and highly extolled, and there are now no theologians more agreeable than Sir Softstep, and: ‘Do me no harm, then I will not bite thee back’; and the whitewashers, reconcilers and daubers, who make one out of two conflicting doctrines and can arrange, declare and concord all manner of Amnestias (agreements by which what has happened is to be regarded as not having happened) in matters of religion. Ah, those are such lovely and fine teachers, those are new quarrelsome fellows, those we will have: But I fear there are too many of them already and there will be more, since it is useful and good to get them through God’s dispensation and punishment. God preserve His own.”

We give yet the following two “Eleganzien” of the old Adam which Spangenberg appraises in his little book. The 1st is: “Our Lord God does not look for a thing so very exactly;” the 54th reads; Everyone comes to heaven by his faith, just as all sorts of merchants, each on his own road, come to the fair at Frankfurt.” Does not the old Adam of the old times seem to have been pretty much the same as the one in the new, in our enlightened times?

The Mitteldinge.

Many otherwise quite well-meaning people wonder not a little that the so-called Old Lutherans do not at once give up so many adiaphora (ceremonies and the like) which they have hitherto used and the use of which is made a special reproach to them. They think that if they did this, quiet and peace would at once ensue; and who would not gladly buy such precious goods at so small a price? What obstinacy, what contempt of souls, therefore, it must take not to be willing to submit to so slight a sacrifice! — Such persons do not consider that here it is not a question of adiaphora, but of doctrine, especially of that concerning Christian liberty, which the evil foe seeks by this way to falsify and to rob; that if we, even now, by yielding, established a little quiet, we should thereby produce later all the greater unrest and confusion of consciences. This conflict, God be thanked! the Church has already once fought through in better times, and has left us, her children, for our sorrowful time a glorious example. This took place in the first years after Luther’s death in the so-called Interimistic controversies, in which the question was whether, in the so-called Mitteldinge, one should not yield to the Papists and thereby prepare a rapprochement. At that time the excellent theologians J. Wigand and Matth. Judex wrote, among other things, the following, which is still well worth taking to heart: “All Adiaphora or Mitteldinge, both small and great, cease to be Mitteldinge when a necessity and constraint, or a divine service, is made of them, or if the confession depends upon them, or if any offense is given thereby, or if one gives the evil appearance of a falling away from the true Church and of a collusion (a secret understanding with the heterodox), of treachery and fellowship with the persecutors, and thereby strengthens the godless persecutors in their obduracy and false opinion, and grieves the Spirit of God in the Christians and lays shame and dishonor upon the name of God.” — Let this be considered, and let no one demand of the Old Lutherans that they should give up even the least thing for the sake of the heterodox. For the sake of those who have become sincerely one with us in doctrine, we are heartily willing and ready to give up even what is dearest (provided God is thereby not dishonored, His truth not injured, and the weak helped). Amsdorf relates of a godly citizen of Zwickau, Jost Schalreuther, who in that time died for God’s Word’s sake, that he was wont to say, when the Mitteldinge were mentioned: “If the Devil and the Antichrist bade me say the Lord’s Prayer, I would not do it.”