# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1848 10 31_S33
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Der Lutheraner.

"God's Word and Luther's doctrine pass away now and nevermore."

Published by the German Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Missouri, Ohio, and Other States.

Edited by C. F. W. Walther.

Volume 5.  St. Louis, Mo., October 31, 1848.  No. 5.

Terms: Der Lutheraner appears once every two weeks at the yearly subscription price of One Dollar for subscribers living at a distance, who are to pay the same in advance and bear the postage. — In St. Louis each single number is sold for 5 cents.

Only those letters which contain communications for the paper are to be sent to the editor; all others, however, which contain business matters, orders, cancellations, money, etc., are to be sent here under the address: Mr. F. W. Barthel, care of C. F. W. Walther, St. Louis, Mo.

J. N. J.

On Some Necessary Matters Which Come into Consideration in the Private Care of Souls.

A Sermon,

delivered during the sessions of the German Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Missouri, Ohio, and Other States at St. Louis, in the Immanuel Church, on June 29, 1848, by G. H. Löber, Pastor at Altenburg, Perry Co., Mo. *)

Grace, mercy, and peace from God, our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Beloved in the Lord Christ! Especially dear and beloved brethren in the ministry!

The public sermon, in which we proclaim the Word of God to a whole assembly, is indeed a quite special chief part of the dear office which has been committed to us. This sermon is the public testimony by which friends and enemies, in regularly ordered discourse, may hear the whole counsel of God unto their salvation. This sermon is therefore also, as it were, the central point of the whole public worship, just as it is also the foundation of the holy Sacraments, which the merciful God adds to His Word as the seals of grace.

Who is able even in some measure to survey the rich blessings in heavenly goods which are dispensed on every Sunday and festival day through the mouth of all upright preachers in the holy place! — "How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of them that bring good tidings, that publish peace!" Thus Isaiah in the Old Covenant already cries out with joyful amazement, when he prophesies of the preaching of the Gospel, which in the blessed times of the New Covenant was to resound loudly and publicly from mountain to mountain, from land to land, and to echo again among all peoples. How, by the first sermon after the outpouring of the Holy Ghost, some 3000 souls were brought to saving faith in Christ! And how countless times has God, even afterward, granted to the thunder of His Word such power that whole multitudes of hearers, perhaps through a single testimony of the truth, were converted from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God. And even though oftentimes many such testimonies were disregarded, yes, cast aside in unbelief by a great part of the multitude, or were again denied by such as once believed, nevertheless even now the pure and clear Word, which is proclaimed from pulpit and altar in the congregation of the Lord, as it is read and meditated upon by the individual, shall not return empty, but shall everywhere, at least in some, accomplish that whereunto it is sent.

*) This sermon is communicated here at the express request of the Synod before which it was delivered. The Editor.

Since, then, beloved brethren, we have the great comfort that the dear Holy Ghost is effectual through the Word also of our preaching, and desires to extend the kingdom of Christ's grace ever farther in this land also, it is certainly also one of our chief tasks that, with the ability which God supplies, we apply all diligence to our sermons, so that the good and gracious will of our God may be attained ever better thereby, that the ignorant may be instructed, the impenitent rebuked, the erring set right, the believing strengthened, the sorrowful comforted, and all who hear us and receive and keep the Word may be saved.

But if this is to come to pass, we must not let it rest merely with the public sermon, but must also with all fidelity take heed to the individual souls entrusted to us, that we proclaim to them the Word of salvation not only publicly but also particularly, and take holy care that this Word be rightly understood, rightly believed, rightly kept by every one, and be applied both to a godly life and to a blessed end.

And of this private care of souls, which next to the public general preaching is likewise committed to us as a chief part of our dear office, we are now to treat further, according to the assignment given me.

But the more I have weighed the scope and the difficulties of this important subject, the more I have wished in sincerity of heart to hear others of my esteemed brethren in the ministry here present speak of this matter. Yet what I have recognized from the Word of our Lord, which alone can give true instruction also concerning right pastoral care, as some essential chief points out of the wide field of this subject, that I will now briefly lay before you according to my weakness, under the gracious assistance of God.

That chapter of Holy Scripture which has been proposed to me for the choice of a text is the twentieth of the Acts of the Apostles, and in particular therein the excellent farewell address of the Apostle Paul, which was read just now, in which he gives his last exhortations to the elders of Ephesus. From this address we take for the present the passage from verse 28 to 32, which reads thus:

"Take heed therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock, over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood. For I know this, that after my departing shall grievous wolves enter in among you, not sparing the flock. Also of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples after them. Therefore watch, and remember, that by the space of three years I ceased not to warn every one night and day with tears. And now, brethren, I commend you to God, and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up, and to give you an inheritance among all them which are sanctified."

Already some verses before this passage the Apostle had testified that he had taught "publicly, and from house to house" in the congregation at Ephesus repentance toward God and faith in our Lord Jesus, and in the words just read he says still more plainly that during his three-