# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1854 10 24_S36
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

36

speak, and many a one will perhaps think, when he reads this: He only wants to show that he knows Greek. But the matter is this, that one cannot get along with what follows, if one knows nothing of the difference mentioned. According to the German one must namely join the words: "for the work of the ministry, whereby the body of Christ may be edified" necessarily with the preceding "that the saints be prepared," so that they in turn give the reason why the saints are prepared. According to the Greek, however, one has the liberty to place them with the words "that the saints -- be" in one rank, and like these to relate them to V. 11, "he has -- appointed." Let us make the trial once. But the reader must first let himself be pleased again to recast the Lutheran German, according to the Greek, into the most un-German form. The first, to be sure, "for the work of the ministry," is given quite literally. Only let it first be recalled that for "for" [zum] at this place there stands another little word than at the beginning of v. 12. Of the difference later. But what Luther has translated thus: "whereby the body of Christ may be edified," is again, for a German mouth, so to speak, a little angular; Luther, who had good teeth, has therefore bitten this also nicely round, as he chewed it over for us. For the words are in the Greek placed quite exactly as the preceding: "for the work of the ministry," and here stands the same "for" as there, not that which Luther gave at the beginning: "that -- (prepared) be." If one will render them quite faithfully, they read in German: for the edification of the body of Christ. Anyone can see that in such form they do not so easily subordinate themselves to their sibling, namely the next preceding "for the work of the ministry," as would be expected according to the German, especially as no one, even in the kingdom of God, gladly leaves the station to which God's order has raised him. Accordingly the 12th verse divides into three series of words, which stand in equal rank beside one another, but all alike under the 11th verse. And now something more about the double "for." The first, at the beginning, properly means before: for when one has a purpose, it shines before one. With such a "for" the goal is designated toward which one steers. The other "for" properly means in and points into all the means and ways, labor and care, to which one must proceed and which one must undertake, if one wants to reach the goal set by the first "for," which in Greek means before. As now in use, with time, the original sense of words generally wears away, just as a man, when he has been knocked about a little in the world, loses some peculiarities and learns more and more to fit himself to all sorts of people, so it has also gone with our "for": the Holy Spirit, however, as He always makes a good distinction, especially as concerns Law and Gospel, has not left out of account the different meaning of the Greek "for" which properly means before and of that which properly means in, and as it is His way, by such inconspicuous means has barred the door against those who, as He well foresaw (cf. Acts 20, 29. 30.), would misuse this verse also for false doctrine. Now let something more be remarked beforehand about the words themselves, that we may then fit everything well hewn together and raise it up like a house.

1. The series: "that the saints be prepared," according to the Greek: for the preparation of the saints. -- The word "preparation" is taken from the business of the surgeon, which he does when he sets a dislocated joint again. This leads, according to the figurative mode of speech which, as we know from the controversy which "der Lutheraner" years ago had once with Mr. Nast, of glorious memory, over the words "this is my body," etc., every language has for the ideas: to bring into order, restore, renew, reconcile, and the like. How gloriously all this fits the purpose for which the LORD has bestowed gifts and offices upon His congregation! Thereby nothing new is to be created, but only mankind, dislocated from its joints and fallen from God, is to be brought again into its right position, led back into God's arms, as it were set again. And those who have already become believers are thereby to come again, continually, out of daily sin to repentance, to God. Yes, the glorious renewal which the last day promises us, the resurrection of the dead, is the final goal of the faithful care which the LORD at the right hand of the Father bears for His bride, when He fulfils the 19th verse of the 68th Psalm. Let one also not forget the addition "of the saints," in order to understand that the Holy Spirit will know nothing of what those read into this His word who take refuge in it in order to build the offices of the Church in the air, and thereby, since the devil rules there, to place them under the protection of the prince of darkness, when they seek another foundation for them than the word of the LORD: "For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them." Matth. 18, 17-20.

2. The series: "for the work of the ministry," corresponding entirely to the Greek. -- What is here translated "work" does not mean first of all the object which one makes, as one calls a pot the work of a potter, so that the congregation should be the work of the ministry, but the labor itself. The word "ministry," however, serves in the Greek text only as a kind of adjective, to describe the labor which is here meant as a very toilsome one. For it is taken from a word which properly means through dust, then signifies a courier, who must always go through the dust and dirt, and finally any servant, never a dignitary, when one has in view something other than his burden. Now that fits also when one wishes to describe the holy ministry, which has always to do with wiping the dust of sins from God's beloved and is also, it may be, pelted with dust and mire of blasphemy.

3. The series: "whereby the body of Christ may be edified," Greek: for the edification of the body of Christ. The Greek word is here taken from the piling up which occurs in building. The labor, which was before followed into detail and afterward described, is here considered according to its extent. Or in other words: First it is said that the labor which a servant of Christ has is in and of itself hard and bitter, and then that it extends very far and will have no end at all. Yet a comfort is mingled in, when the Holy Spirit names the field of labor, the body of Christ.

If one will, one can also find the difference of the 2nd and 3rd series in the words "of the ministry" and "the body of Christ," so that the emphasis would lie on the former in the 2nd, on the latter in the 3rd series, and the sense of both series in good German would be something like this: the ministry shall have the labor, the body of Christ, however, the blessing of being edified.

Although everyone will now find for himself how the 11th and 12th verses are to be understood in connection according to these hints, yet I will not let myself be prevented from drawing the sum and briefly paraphrasing v. 11 and 12 in the sense which follows of itself from what has been said.

It is the LORD who has given to His Church apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers to the end that His saints may one day stand before Him as the holy Revelation 21, 3, describes ("that the saints be prepared") -- that is the purpose --, thus to this end, that they labor like one around whose head the dust flies ("for the work of the ministry") and always have their hands full, because the body of Christ has been committed to them ("whereby the body of Christ may be edified") -- this is what befits the apostles, etc.; for this purpose they have been given, in their own persons, to the congregation, that that goal may be reached.

This is at least an interpretation of our passage which corresponds to the original speech of the Holy Spirit. On the other hand every simple eye sees that it is a distortion of the Word of God, or at least a perverse interpretation of it, if one draws the words: "for the work of the ministry" in the sense to the next preceding: "That the saints be prepared," so that the purpose of the preparation of the saints would be to make them in a similar way into a work of the ministry, as the pot is the work of the potter. How meaningless! Just as if one said: the smith forges a nail so that the nail may have the honor of being made by the smith. Who can imagine that the Holy Spirit would have so empty a speech written down: the saints are to be prepared