# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1851 03 04_S111
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

111

Pastor Gogelen, the Synod made no scruple of receiving him as an advisory member.

But what is more, and sets the crown upon the matter, is this: the same hireling preacher, Herr Gogelen, was afterwards received as a member into the Synod, without conscientious investigation of the just complaints of Herr Pastor Heid, which were mentioned above.

Thus by this act of the Synod a man was recognized as a brother in Christ and as a servant of the Lutheran Church, who is not only a manifest Unionist and gives the Holy Supper now to Reformed, now to Lutherans, can instruct now according to the Lutheran, now according to the Heidelberg, or this and that united catechism, in short, is two-natured and, like a bat, half bird, half mammal, but concerning whom the Synod also must have been in doubt whether he had a regular call in and near Wappaconetto from Christian congregations, or whether he had only let himself be hired by godless fellows, who by their hatred and aversion against Christ's wholesome discipline and order in Matt. 18, 15—17 and against other necessary parts of a sound churchly congregational life have rejected a faithful teacher and thereby excluded themselves from the Church of God and put themselves under the ban?

Would it not have been the duty of the Synod, before it received Herr Gogelen, to institute a thorough investigation and to appoint a committee to Wappaconetto, distant only 15 miles, and also to call upon Pastor Heid to prove his complaint against Herr Gogelen? And if this committee had found it so, as Pastor Heid reported to the President, should not the Synod then have admonished Herr Gogelen most earnestly forthwith to leave those so-called congregations, and rather to seek to move them to penitent return to their regularly called pastor and to the congregation that had remained faithful? But if Herr Gogelen refused either the investigation, or, if he was found guilty, compliance with this admonition, then of course the Synod could not receive him. But if it did so nevertheless, it confirmed, to be sure, by receiving him, as a churchly body, this his shameful and godless manner of acting, and made itself partaker of his dreadful sin, in that he served insolent and undisciplined people as a congregation of Christ, against all better instruction, and thereby strengthened them in their stiffneckedness and impenitence. And would it not be dreadful that accordingly a whole Synod, instead of furthering the kingdom of God, should rather be a helper in strengthening the kingdom of the devil? For every time the wretched hireling dispensed the Holy Supper to the wilful Separatists, to his own and their judgment, the Synod set up with him the abomination of desolation in the holy place and made itself partaker of other men's sin; every time one of these enemies of the Lord and of his Word should die in his sins, the Synod would be accessory to his eternal destruction.

They will, to be sure, adorn themselves herewith and exhibit the overflow of their evangelical disposition and saving love, and say: Yes! though those people may have erred, it would yet be wrong "to rob them of the means of grace or to compel them to take back their former preacher; that is not done in America"; — words which the Herr President himself wrote to Pastor Heid on the occasion of another congregation.

What is one to say to such sayings, which measure God's Word and order by American disorder, but not this by that? Who else robs the defiant and stubborn people of the means of grace, if not they themselves? And is that truly saving love, or not rather ruinous folly, when wilful Separatists are regarded and served as Christian congregations and thereby strengthened in their wickedness and impenitence? Where is the command of Christ to act so in such a case? Does he not, on the contrary, command: "Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine?" But indeed, that is a hard saying, who can hear it? That is not done in America.

But this is done — and in this loving devotion to American taste the Ohio Synod, together with its like-minded sister Synods, exercises itself in no small measure — this is done, to be a "hired" preacher, baptizer, confirmer, dispenser of the Supper, marrier and grave-orator; but this is not done, to take care diligently, as a father in Christ, of the special spiritual need of individuals, to rebuke, to comfort and to admonish; this is done, to confirm people who, without being feeble-minded, have nevertheless not been taught the holy Ten Commandments and the Creed*) and were thus admitted, as wholly unfit for self-examination, to the Holy Supper, but it is not done, to impart also to the weak, by faithful teaching and care, the needful understanding of the Christian truth of salvation; — this is done, to accept a heap of congregations, to preach in each every four weeks, after American taste (that is, according to the proverb: wash my fur, but do not make me wet), a loose medley of Law and Gospel, and to hold no catechization of children, and then to ride home in all haste; but this is not done, to serve one or at most two congregations thoroughly and carefully, and, without fear of man and care for the belly, to rebuke sharply with the Law also the favorite American sins, as there are: covetousness, bad bringing up of children, rule of wives, inconstancy, sloth, etc., and to comfort with the Gospel only those who hunger and thirst after righteousness: — this is done, to neglect the poor children thoroughly and leave them wholly to the district schools, and afterward to dispose of the confirmation instruction as quickly as possible; but this is not done, first, by friendly, earnest instruction and admonition of the parents, to set up congregational schools, and to instruct and bring up the children themselves from youth up in and with God's Word, in Biblical history and catechism, texts and hymns, as the nursery and hope of the Church; — this is done, to let oneself be hired and engaged by the congregations for a time, and so to be hireling preachers and servants of men, who do not wield the staff Woe, and may not lift up their voice like a trumpet; but this is not done, to demand a regular call and, as God's servants and ministers of Christ, to rebuke, to threaten, to admonish, and to carry out the church discipline ordained by the Lord even to the ban.

*) These cases can be proved.

In this and like manner it comes to pass that the preachers of this Synod, in that they accommodate themselves to the corrupt taste and the spoiling of their people, which they, foolishly, seem to hold for love, are not able to bring their congregations from within to a sound churchly knowledge and form, and a Christian churchly congregational life cannot arise under such care and guidance.

But in order now, after this digression, to arrive at the right final judgment concerning the above manner of acting of the Synod, this is certain, that it has acted not even rightly, to say nothing of Christianly and churchly, and has shown anew what is to be thought of its professing the Symbols of the Lutheran Church and of its confessional sincerity, namely that it is not in earnest therewith, but the churchly confession is to it a mere signboard behind which it, as before, carries on its loose, frivolous ways and lets the poor congregations decay and perish churchly more and more. God help in grace at least those out of it who still will let themselves be helped. —

God's Judgment upon an Enemy of the Truth.

What an arch enemy of the truth Dr. Eck, with whom Luther disputed at Leipzig, had been is known. Once a rumor spread of his having died. Bucer therefore reported in one of his writings that it was said Eck was dead. The rumor was unfounded. With a triumphant heart Eck read that he was said to be dead. Straightway, therefore, he set about convincing his opponents, by the publication of a book, that he was still alive and on the field. The title which he gave this book was the words: "Quia Eccius vivit!" that is, Because Eck still lives. But what happened? At the moment when the book was issued at Ingolstadt, Eck had ceased to live. On his short sick-bed of some