# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1850 08 06_S195
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

195

nor any one in particular to be baptized, then we will baptize no one. But He did bid baptize all the Gentiles, excluding none, where He says, Matt. 28:19: "Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in my name," etc. Now the children are also a great part of the Gentiles.

50. So we read in the Acts of the Apostles, chap. 2:39, chap. 16:15, and in St. Paul's Epistles, 1 Cor. 1:16, how they baptized whole households; but the children are truly also a good part of the households, so that it appears that, just as Christ commands them without any distinction "to teach and baptize all nations," so they also did, and in the households baptized everything that was therein. They did not foresee that the factious spirits would seek a distinction between young and old, since otherwise they write so much in all the Epistles that there is "no respect nor distinction of persons" among Christians, Rom. 10:12; they would otherwise have put down and expressed all of it. For St. John also, 1 Ep. 2:13, writes to the little children that "they know the Father." And surely infant baptism has come from the Apostles, as St. Augustine also writes.

51. Therefore the Anabaptists act altogether dangerously, in that they are not only uncertain of their cause, but also act against such passages as have been adduced, and invent a distinction of persons out of their own heads, which GOD has not made. For even though they should imagine that they were not sufficiently overcome thereby; yet, however contentious they are, they must at the least be horrified at it, and get a misgiving that they do wrong, and rebaptize themselves upon uncertain grounds. But if they are uncertain, it is already decided that they do wrong: for in divine matters one must not play with the uncertain, but with the certain.

52. For when an Anabaptist hears (who is not stiff-necked, but willing to be taught) that, just as John became believing and holy when Christ came and spoke through His mother's mouth, so the child also becomes believing when Christ in baptism speaks to it through the baptizer's mouth, since it is His word, His command, and His word cannot go in vain; then the Anabaptist must nevertheless say: It might truly be so! and he cannot wholly and steadfastly deny it, nor bring forward Scripture against it. But if he cannot steadfastly and with good ground deny it, then neither can he steadfastly maintain his rebaptism: for he must first steadfastly prove that children are baptized without faith, if he is to confirm rebaptizing. Thus I think it is sufficiently proved that their ground is uncertain and sheer presumption.

53. Well then, I suppose that they could altogether make certain that children are without faith in baptism: I should still gladly know on what ground they would prove that they ought for that reason to be baptized again, if they afterwards become believing or confessing of the faith? For it is not enough that they say: they were baptized without faith, therefore they are to be baptized again; they must give a reason. It is a wrong baptism, you say. What of that? Nevertheless it is a baptism: yea, it is a right baptism in itself, except that they received it wrongly. For the words have been spoken and everything done that belongs to baptism, as fully as happens when faith is there.

54. Now when a thing is right in itself, it need not on that account be renewed in any other way, though it was wrongly received: let the wrong be put away, and all becomes right, without any renewal. Abusus non tollit substantiam, imo confirmat substantiam, that is: Abuse changes nothing in the being of a thing: yea, without being there can be no abuse. If, then, faith should come ten years after baptism, why should one baptize again, since baptism has now been altogether satisfied, and all has become right? For he now believes, as baptism requires. Faith is not for the sake of baptism, but baptism for the sake of faith. When faith now comes, baptism has what is its own, and rebaptism is in vain.

(To be continued.)

Is a Union of Evangelical Lutheran and Reformed Churches to be Made?*)

*) This is again one of the Alsatian Tracts. Ed.

This question has for some time been much discussed, and by some has been answered in the affirmative with enthusiasm, by others in the negative with earnestness. As the matter now stands, and is still being pushed, for example, in France or in Alsace, no evang. Lutheran Christian of Alsace and Lorraine, or even of lands already united, is any longer permitted to remain indifferent; every one must take sides, and bring it to a Yes or to a No.

Do not say, perhaps, that these are things which you townsfolk and country people do not understand, which do not concern you, and which only learned men are to settle. The present little writing is to give the proper guidance that you may learn to understand the matter. That it concerns you, and not the learned alone, ought to be plain to everyone to whom religion and church lie at heart. Only an unbeliever and despiser of the sanctuary can say indifferently: "Do with the church what you will, what is it to me." What? Brethren! the question is whether our church is to remain as we have inherited it from the fathers of the faith; whether the jewel of our faith is to be kept inviolate? or whether it is to be otherwise with faith and church usages? and you would say: That does not concern me? You know the proverb: "Silence gives consent." Now, if you say nothing, and let them do as they please, it may well happen that on some fine morning it is a thing done, without your having been asked. Therefore, dear brethren, take the matter earnestly to heart: Prove all things; hold fast that which is good (1 Thess. 5:21). Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find (Matt. 7:7).

I. "Is it time that the Lutheran and Reformed churches unite?"

The writer of this confesses that he is one of those who answer this question with a decided No, and his aim is precisely, in what follows, to justify this No and, God willing, to win others to it. But where the mingling of churches has already taken place, in church or mission, there it is time that this work of Babel cease, whereby the Lord's work is hindered.

It is to be foreseen that such an answer pains many a soul which would gladly see the whole world as One flock under One shepherd. And to that end, it is thought, the union of the Lutherans and the Reformed would be a laudable beginning. Well! we too have such a wish, and should account it a sinful undertaking to be against it. But this is our conviction, that all union takes place in the mind of our Savior only when it rests upon oneness in the truth and in the faith; every other union is contrivance and hypocrisy, which sooner or later comes miserably to shame. When a union takes place now, men give one another the hand not on the ground of faith, but on the ground of doubt and unbelief. In such doing there is no blessing — and he who fears God does not help to build upon a church which has an indefinite faith. Read rather of the true union in Eph. 4:3-6.*)

*) The dear St. Louis "Friedensbote" has prudently made only the 3d verse its motto. It relies upon it, and perhaps not without reason, that its readers will overlook the belonging 5th verse with its "One faith, one baptism." Ed.

But let us hear, once, those who want a union and work toward it; they say: "It is now time to promote such a work of union, for we Lutherans and Reformed are indeed really already one in faith; the doctrines of difference which formerly divided the two sister churches have indeed long since been given up on both sides; so that, for example, in the doctrine of the Holy Supper the Lutherans have become Reformed, and in the doctrine of election the Reformed have become Lutheran. We both stand indeed upon the same ground: Christ and His Word. Where there is still a difference, one covers it up with love, and thinks: in such mysterious spiritual things as religion is, men will never agree anyhow, but each will have his own thoughts. Besides, it is now