# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1851 10 14_S29
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

29

How faithfully Christ loves His Church, mine own;
His love He has there portrayed,
Accursed be he who reviles the married state.
Highly honored is the master of the house,
To whom God has granted a housewife,
Well adorned with faith and virtue,
Who stands in awe of him, fears him and cowers,
Provides well for everything at home in the house,
And does not run about to every corner,
Who also is no sour pot,
Has no stubborn, wild head,
Does not forever play the courtier, and new fashions
Would have, and not be greatly esteemed.
Who does not always stand before the mirror,
And go about in weekday dress every day;
Who gives her husband no smeared-over words,
And has her heart in another place.
Who has not the window always at her neck,
Is not quarrelsome and chatters over everything.
Who does not stand much beneath the door,
Taking notice of all who pass by.
Well for him who gets such a bride;
An evil wife is a bitter herb,
A bitter gall and gentian,
Of which let both horse and man beware.
But a chaste, cheerful wife
Gladdens her husband's heart within him;
Like a noble juice of the vine,
Gives the man joy, honor, gladness and strength.
The greatest possession and morning-gift
Is that she have discipline and virtue,
And keep all things in the house in good order.
No firmer lock has a householder.
Let the man be pious like Tobias,
And the wife silent like Zacharias,
Thus may one have peace in the house.
Nothing good does an evil wife accomplish,
Who is ever in her husband's ears,
And kindles many an evil fire.
Jezebel and Herodias,
They pour where it is already wet;
They are true fire-stokers,
And the devil's inciters;
They urge and bark ever "up, up,"
Until they bring the man to flare up,
So that he does what afterward he rues,
Those are brats and wicked hides.
But those who are like Abigail,
Gentle of spirit, can greatly
Still the ill-humor and wrath of men,
Much evil is left undone for their sake.
The rich mine-finder Pithius,
Was obliged to obey his discreet wife,
Who knew how to use trifling
And right courteous jest and sport:
She prepared show-dishes of gold,
Brought them to her husband that he should eat them,
Because he despised husbandry,
And strove only after ore in the mine.
A good word finds a good place,
As was shown there.
Where heart and mind agree together,
A man takes the treasure from God Himself.
Where children are merry and fresh,
Laugh and sit around the table,
Especially where there are children's children;
They say: my dear grandfather,
I will give you a good little hug,
Comb your beard, braid and adorn it;
And afterward share chatter around,
Bliss and joy is in that house.
For what can be more lovely
Than pious and obedient little children;
In the grandmother's body the heart burns,
When one but names her child's child;
A lovelier name one does not find,
Than when one says Father and Mother.
On the other hand woe befalls those,
Who bear no fruit in wedlock,
To be barren and without heirs,
Is as if no sunshine shone.
What can a childless man tell you
Of joy, delight and merry days;
He who lives with his wife in unity,
Has the greatest joy.
In the marriage-bed is the greatest chastity,
Accursed be the state of the spiritless *)
For therein all knavery,
And unchastity rule without shame or fear.
Paphnutius **), the pious man,
Has faithfully shown such things.

*) The clergy living in enforced celibacy under the Papacy.

**) This Paphnutius was a pious bishop in Africa, who still bore on his body the marks of the persecution of Maximinus. He, although himself living in the unmarried state, nevertheless at the Council of Nicaea in 325 opposed the proposal already made at that time to introduce celibacy, or the unmarried state of the clergy, as a church law, with such happy success that this calamitous ordinance was at that time still left undone.

(Conclusion to follow.)

Methodism.

Conclusion. †)

†) See No. 26, Vol. 7.

If it were true what the Methodists say, that a man through the grace of sanctification can attain in this life to perfect sinlessness, then an example of it must surely be found in Holy Scripture. But we search for it in vain. True, we read in Holy Scripture of a man who boasted that he had no sin, saying: God, I thank thee, that I am not as other men are, Luke 18, 11. But this man was a Pharisee, whom Christ sets forth as a warning example of blind and presumptuous pride, and of whom He says that because of his pride he was not justified, but abased, that is, condemned. On the other hand, Christ shows in the example of the publican which men are saved, not the great saints, who hold themselves better than the others, but the poor sinners, who humbly confess their sins, repent of them with godly sorrow, and in faith lay hold of God's grace in Christ.

That now the Methodist doctrine of the grace of sanctification, whereby a man can already here below become wholly sinless, is a manifest, gross, shameless lie, we prove with the plainest passages of Holy Scripture.

1. If it were possible in this world already to lay aside all sin, then this must be the case above all with the holy prophets and apostles, who were better than we and had a richer measure of the Holy Ghost. But they confess themselves without distinction to be poor sinners. The holy Isaiah says 64, 6.: We are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags. The holy James says 3, 2.: In many things we offend all. The holy Jeremiah says: Lam. 3, 42.: We, we have transgressed and have rebelled.

2. Even the saints have need daily of the forgiveness of sins; therefore Christ has given us for daily, diligent use the holy Lord's Prayer, in which we daily pray: Forgive us our debts. Ps. 32, 5. 6. Thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin. For this shall every one that is godly pray unto thee in a time when thou mayest be found. If now all the saints must pray for this, namely for the forgiveness of sins, to God in due season, that is, daily, so long as it is yet to-day and the time of grace endures, then that is a proof that in this life they cannot yet become sinless. Ps. 19, 13. Who can understand his errors? Cleanse thou me from secret faults.

3. He who is without sin can stand in the judgment of God. Since now all believers ever pray that God would not bring them before His judgment, they confess thereby that there is still sin in them. Ps. 143, 2.: Enter not into judgment with thy servant, for in thy sight shall no man living be justified. Ps. 130, 2. If thou, Lord, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand? 1 Cor. 4 4,. I know nothing by myself; yet am I not hereby justified. The Apostle confesses thereby that although he could remember no known sin, yet he could not stand before God with his works, since his sins of weakness already made him damnable before God.

4. If the Methodists were right with their doctrine of the grace of sanctification, there would have to take place in the sanctified already here below a complete victory of the Spirit and a total mortification of the flesh. But Holy Scripture describes the inner life of Christians as an unceasing conflict between Spirit and flesh, between the new man and the old Adam. Gal. 5, 16. 17. This I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would. According to the Spirit Christians are heartily willing to fulfil God's commandments; but because the flesh also still stirs in them with its evil lusts and desires, they do not do the good which they actually wish to do; often they leave it undone or at least do not accomplish it perfectly. — This conflict between flesh and Spirit the Apostle describes at length in Rom. 7, 14—25. This passage has been wrongly applied to the state of an unconverted man. But it says there v. 18: To will is present with me, but how to perform that which is good I find not. Now an unconverted man cannot