# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1855 06 19_S170
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

170

fear was the cause why we hesitated so long to carry it out. We knew well how much easier it would then be for the devil, the world, and our own flesh to ensnare us and part us from one another, than if we marched out and in together in one undivided camp under his banner. And the more we felt the blessing of this fellowship, the greater was the apprehension that today or tomorrow we might become estranged from one another, that the bonds which entwined us might first be loosened, and at last perhaps be wholly dissolved or torn asunder. And what more destructive plague could be found than discord and division among confessors of One faith, and children of One heavenly Father? Why then should not the same feeling pervade us now, when the division, required by the most urgent necessity, has been carried out in trust upon the Lord, why not today, when we see ourselves assembled for the first time without our brethren? why should not each one among us implore the Lord for the preservation of the high gift of concord and of firm holding together in one mind, faith and work? That I too, therefore, have chosen the preservation of unity as the subject of our present meditation, your love will find quite natural. The text on which it rests we find 1 Cor. 1, 10.

Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you, but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment.

God be praised that the exhortation of the holy Apostle does not meet us in the same way as the Corinthian congregation. There the concord was torn, and the abominations of the schism of the church lie before our eyes in the epistle. There the rent was to be healed by the exhortation. We stand today still — yet only by the wonderful, undeserved grace of God — firmly bound together upon the ground of the common faith and confession, held together by the bond of divine love, contending for the One truth, building and working at the One work to the honor of God and our own and our brethren's salvation. Here no rent is to be healed, but the only thing that matters is that what God has wrought through his Word and Spirit be also preserved hereafter. The exhortation of the Apostle contains for us the answer to the question:

To what must we especially give heed with all diligence, so that in the external division of the Synod we may nevertheless remain One, and that no separation may arise out of the division?

It runs:

1. To this, that we all speak the same thing;

2. to this, that we hold fast together in one mind and in the same judgment.

May the Lord, however, who lives in us, bless his Word upon our hearts, that it may accomplish that whereunto he has sent it. Amen!

1. First, then, we must see to it that we all speak the same thing.

When a man does not remain the same in his speech, that is rightly counted a sign that the matter is not pure and he himself does not stand firm in the truth. Now in the Scriptures we have not only the One, full, saving truth, but the Holy Spirit has clothed the deepest mysteries for the simple and the childlike in the plainest, clearest words most corresponding to the sense and content. He is also not wavering and changeable in his expressions, but although he has spoken through a period of thousands of years, and through men of the most various gifts, dispositions and degrees of outward culture, yet with the greatest variety of the revelations and many-sidedness of their presentation and application, we find throughout the Old and New Testament a uniformity in expression and in manner of speech, which testifies to us that the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth, and his revelation just the simple, heavenly, single and eternal truth unto salvation.

The same mark the Church of all times and of all lands bears upon her. She remains simple, as in the sense, so in the words of the Scriptures. Thereby she confronts the many-colored lie of the Wicked One and his companions, when it is clothed in the shimmering garment of deep wisdom and goes forth under the sound of high, but ever changing and differently sounding words, in order by false doctrine to befool the hearts of men, and to lead them into the depths of Satan and their eternal ruin. Where now the old evil Foe was at work smuggling his lies into the Church under biblical expressions, and through glosses and interpretations removing the right sense from the eyes of the believers, there necessity indeed required that the right sense be set against the false sense, the right interpretation against the false interpretation. But here also the same peculiar mark of the Church showed itself. In the struggle with the lie there was soon found, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, the expression sought and implored in true fear of God's Word, which simply, clearly, definitely and without ambiguity gave back the meaning of the Scripture, and exposed the hypocritical serpentine windings of the deceiving enemy and made them harmless to the upright. And to these expressions laid down in the Confessions the Church then held. In them the truth, recognized, maintained and newly established, was taught, preached, defended, sung and taken to heart.

The Church in all times, in all lands and tongues has this peculiarity, grounded in the nature of the thing, that as she has one and the same eternal, unchangeable truth, lives in it, confesses it, so also in matters of faith and doctrine she speaks the same thing. — And that is a power outward and inward. Through this uniformity of speech she conquers outwardly, for it is, in the face of the world, the most powerful testimony to her victorious truth. Thereby she exposes the liar and murderer from the beginning, who through the Babylonian confusion of tongues which prevails in his host bears witness against himself that his kingdom is the lie, and his servants and workmen are liars; thereby she strengthens herself inwardly, and brings it about that even her weak, her childlike and her simple ones feel secure in the closed column of the army, walk upright, strong and valiant, fight and conquer with her through their simple testimony. It is a true bond of unity. Thereby the host of God is held together in concord as under One victorious banner. Thereby each one feels at home among his own. It is the watchword by which generals, officers and soldiers recognize one another as belonging to one camp, and so, in right confidence, can stand by one another and walk together. Therefore the Apostle, when he exhorts to concord, urges first that the believers all speak the same thing.

First also for this reason, that the enemy seeks to enter here first and often under a very innocent-seeming pretext. He knows well that when he has broken the uniformity of speech in matters of doctrine and faith, he has not only, as it were, taken her banner from the Church and weakened the force of her testimony, but that he will soon bring it about that the unity of mind and judgment, of doctrine and faith, is torn asunder, and confusion, strife and bitter contention are brought into the otherwise concordant host, whereby he will wear himself out and be ruined.

For the use and introduction of new, unusual, or even suspicious expressions and phrases, in place of the usual ones generally received in the Church, in matters of doctrine, faith and confession, must of necessity cause confusion in the Church. However innocent they may be in themselves, the weak at least stumbles at them. He perhaps has not the acuteness to recognize the truth also under this expression, as under the accustomed one, and since it concerns the dearest and most important thing, on which the salvation of his soul hangs, who can blame him if he becomes distrustful of it! It must seem suspicious to him that the old, familiar truth is not set forth in such expressions as are current among Christian people, by which everyone knows what he is to think; there must, he thinks, be something else behind it; he fears that with the adoption of the new manner of speech he may also take over a new doctrine, and together with the old accustomed expression give up the old truth, which just so has made itself accessible to his understanding, so worth and dear to his heart. Those who burn when they see that others are offended, for whom Christ died — and who should not burn here? — they cannot keep silent: they rebuke the brother's wrong, they uncover