# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1850 06 11_S163
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

163

blind tools. In the Church there shall be no spiritual guardianship; the knowledge of the mysteries of religion shall not be the monopoly of a particular class, of a priestly caste. Every Christian shall bear the Urim and Thummim of truth, as a spiritual priest, upon his own breast. The layman shall therefore himself search in the Scripture, himself draw from the fountain, and believe from his own free conviction, without building upon human authority; he shall not, like a lifeless machine, say, like that charcoal-burner: "I believe what the Church believes," without having recognized, examined and tested the faith of the Church. The layman shall be certain of his relation to God without human, priestly mediation, and be able himself to give an answer and a reason for the hope that is in him, without having to appeal to the better insight of his teacher. Yea, the layman shall be able, and become ever more able, to judge the doctrine of his teacher, to distinguish the true from the erroneous, and so himself to watch over his watchmen. Christians shall be children in malice, but men in understanding. Only when the Church is so constituted has it the form which its eternal Founder gave it, who said: "One is your Master, even Christ; and all ye are brethren." Hence the Prophet, too, already prophesied of the Church of the New Covenant, "None shall teach another; but they shall all be taught of God, both small and great." (Jer. 31, 34. John 6, 45.)

Irrefutably it follows from this, of what high interest it is for the Church that it be a nurse of science and education in every respect: the holy duty of self-preservation commands it so; without this fostering the Church would give back again the trophies of victory won by the Reformation and transform itself anew into a papacy; it would give itself up, neglect its building up and its defense, and so become a murderess of itself.

Only upon one point more may I be permitted to point: that the Church is a friend and nurse of art and science is finally required also by the task and the calling which it has.

As soon as the great truths of the Gospel have been received into the soul of a man, the man gets not only a sense for the spiritual, the divine, the heavenly, but for everything beautiful, true and good in general. Not only does the kingdom of grace open itself to such a man, but also the kingdom of nature. He now looks upon the powers, faculties and gifts laid by God in men and other creatures with quite other eyes than before. He admires them with the most heartfelt pleasure as glorious works and creations of God and as revelations of His infinite goodness.

But as it is a natural consequence of living faith in the Gospel that before the eyes of the believer the earthly, insofar as it is God's creature, is transfigured as God's work, so it is also the calling and task of the Church that it recognize the work of God in the poor world corrupted by sin, and for its part help to the end that the powers, faculties and gifts laid by God in men and in nature may be developed, the temporal general welfare also advanced, but above all that God be recognized and praised in His works. Since, then, human sciences and arts are also good gifts of God, not only have the members of the Church a hearty pleasure in them also, but also the task and the calling to be their nurses.

May then the house for which we today intend to lay the cornerstone become and remain a witness, though a mute one, yet an intelligible one, to this: that our Evangelical Lutheran Church also is a faithful and sincere nurse of art and science; may both find here an undisturbed, quiet place and grow up as a tree which stretches its crown toward heaven and bends its branches to the earth; whose fruits many here with faithful diligence gather by sun and lamplight, and then carry out into the world. But may here also art and science never become the idol to which altars are built, but solely the means that the Church, upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, be built also in this western land, gloriously adorned and bravely and victoriously defended, true enlightenment and welfare of the world be advanced, but above all God's honor be spread abroad and His name be highly lauded and praised to the end of days. Amen!

(Communicated.)

Der Missionsbote.

The Missionsbote*) issues in its third number an epistle "to the Lutheran Church of North America," wherein it declares its "conviction," which it has obtained "by the power of the Holy Spirit." It states that it had been its purpose "not to meddle in the confessions," but that it is now "challenged thereto in the Lutheraner, by the missionaries Auch and Maier." Such a "challenge" is now hardly to be found in the Lutheraner, and this matter might therefore not be further considered, had not the Missionsbote itself asked for it. For it says: "This" (its conviction obtained by the power of the Holy Spirit, namely) "I lay before all thoughtful and sincere brethren who honestly mean well by the Church and the kingdom of God among Jews, Turks and heathen, for consideration, and if my conviction can be shown to me to be mistaken and incorrect, then set me right, according to the admonition of Scripture, with a spirit of meekness, but not with abusive and slanderous words, and with blustering language I will not let sand be thrown in my eyes, but by thorough proofs from the Holy Scriptures." — Since now the Missionsbote would gladly have a reply, may these lines serve it for that, in which it will find, as we hope, neither abusive and slanderous words, nor yet a blustering language that seeks to throw sand in its eyes.

*) Published by P. Steiner, Massillon, Ohio.

It is now almost three hundred years since several pious theologians joined together to heal, with God's help, the damage which open and hidden Calvinism had done in the Lutheran Church, and to sweep out the leaven of false doctrine. Their endeavor was also gloriously crowned; for it had been undertaken in the name of God and had the glory of God and the salvation of men for its aim. And so in May of the year 1577 there came into being the glorious book, "the Formula of Concord," the "Symbol of the Theologians and Scholars." The book which is composed "most deliberately and most commonly of all Lutheran symbols and forms the necessary complement of the rest into a complete whole." This book, as it is the honor and joy of all faithful Lutheran Christians, of all who from the heart and without guile are devoted to the Augsburg Confession, so it has also from of old been the apple of discord and stone of stumbling for all those whose hidden false doctrine is therein uncovered and rebuked. And as in the first Christian Church the heretics also were well content with the Apostles' Creed, but could not endure the Nicene Creed, because it uncovered and condemned their false doctrine: so it has also gone from of old in the Protestant Church. The Augsburg Confession men still tolerate well enough, because they twist its simple words according to their pleasure and then think it agrees with their own "conviction"; the Formula of Concord, on the other hand, they cannot bear, although it wants to be nothing and is nothing but a "thorough, pure, correct and final repetition and explanation of several articles of the Augsburg Confession," because, namely, the Formula of Concord uncovers the hidden false doctrine of such people, illumines it with the Word of God and condemns it. And so in the whole time of its existence many an arrow, hidden and open, has been shot against it, but behold! as yet men have not only been unable to inflict any defeat upon it, but not even to gain a weak point against it. Still it stands there armed on all sides, the sword of the Word of God in its faithful hand, with which it has brought to nought, and will doubtless also in future bring to nought, all who approach it with a mind to fight. In Germany, its fatherland, it has therefore already acquired such respect that men no longer dare an open combat with it, only now and then