# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1850 08 06_S199
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

199

errors also be in it. But he is hostile not only to this book, but also to those who are devoted to the book but averse to the present false union; for he wishes, as he is wont to say, to become all things to all men: among the Old Lutherans one of that kind (as he proved with Pastor Löhe in Bavaria), among those of unionistic mind likewise, having kept only the name "Lutheran"; among the Reformed, like them, yes, even among the Catholics a Romanist! He thus progresses with the times and is, for what he, namely, merely takes himself to be, a scientific man who is versed in the present standpoint.

2. The expression "natural body" is also justified by the testimony of the old church teachers (see Formula of Concord, Chap. 7, and others) and of various more recent, even united, catechisms, of which I will cite only a few.

Albert Geißler in his catechism asks: "What does one partake of in the Holy Supper? Answer: Bread, wine; body and blood of Jesus Christ. The body which one partakes of is the same which was born of the Virgin Mary, died on the cross, rose again and ascended into heaven, and now sitteth at the right hand of the Father; this body He can make visible and invisible, with this the Lord Jesus is not merely in heaven, but everywhere with His own. The blood of Jesus Christ in the Supper is the same which He shed in His suffering and death, of which not a drop saw corruption."

Even Rud. Stier, this champion of the union, writes: "We believe steadfastly that the Lord Himself feeds and gives us drink wonderfully with the body that was broken on the cross, and the blood that was shed from the same body, for thus hath the Lord spoken in His Testament: 'this is' — ! and thereby we abide."

Spener asks: "What manner of body of Christ is this? Answer: The true, essential body of Christ, which He took of the Virgin Mary, in which He lived, died, rose again, and still has about Him; for it is the very one which He gave for us.

"But what manner of blood is it? Answer: The essential blood of Christ, which He had and shed for us, therefore a holy sacrificial blood, which is God's own." (Over the latter expression "God's blood" the Missionsbote ventures to say mockingly: "God has no blood.")

Thus many more testimonies might be cited, which with Luther, according to the clear Word of Christ, confess: "That the Lord's bread in the Supper is His true natural body, which the ungodly receives just as well as all the saints." And likewise one might use the word "material" also, without being one who partakes of Christ in a Capernaitic manner, as Hunnius also does, § 696, if one only believes, again with Luther, according to God's Word, "that the Lord's bread in the Supper," etc.

3. If I am finally accused of sectarianism on account of the churchly expression "natural body," what then shall I confess according to the word of Paul, who heard from the mouth of Jesus: "This is my body, which is broken for you"? 1 Cor. 11. The body, then, if I go backward, the body which is present in the other incomprehensible spiritual manner, in which it takes up no room (Formula of Concord 7.), is no other than that which ascended to the right hand of God, and this is the same which rose from the grave, and from the grave none other than that came forth which once will show even to the enthusiasts, who do not know what kind of spirit or Christ they are to paint for themselves in the Supper, His nail-prints which He suffered on the cross. But there, on the cross, hung the Son of man, born of Mary, who died, who saith: this is my body, which is given for you.

Or shall I believe that another Christ suffered for me? another said: this is my body? another ascended into heaven? another will come again to judgment? another is present at the Supper, to bless and distribute? I teach and receive in the Supper the Christ present under bread and wine, who once as Savior died for us sinners and who with His now glorified body, which He once gave up (therefore again the natural one), present, speaks: "Take, this is my body," etc.; and although blind reason cannot reconcile this (for natural body and supernatural partaking will agree as little as "to be conceived in the womb without the doing of a man, John 1.," or "God became man"), yet faith saith: "Thus saith the Son of God, the faithful and true witness, and God from heaven calleth to me: Hear ye him."

That is what I believe, and I gladly let it pass when the Missionsbote says: "A man or a congregation that believes this cannot in truth be of sound mind" — for one must allow something to want of understanding. I only fear that the editor of the Missionsbote might at last go too far and confess with Dr. Kurtz: "If Luther, yea, if Paul and Peter came again, they would have to learn of us."

Moreover, if the Missionsbote takes me for a veritable sectarian, I am content, for I do belong to the sect which for 300 years has been contradicted, because it has separated itself from the kingdom of lies; but whence then comes the new sect, the evangelical church league? what does it want? whither does it hasten? Time will teach that, out of the lack of confession, to a life of ease, it leads into unbelief. for this love also bears all things in an evil way (only no decisiveness).

This, then, as a brief defense against brazen untruths. I am, moreover, far from bearing a grudge against the person, for if one were to ask the Missionsbote: do you say this of yourself or have others told it to you?" he would have to confess that he has lent himself as a henchman of false brethren, to whom nothing lies more at heart than to root out the Lutheran doctrine. Let the Missionsbote henceforth stay with his missionary department and not again care for other congregations until the church ordains him a church visitor; but should he again have a mind to polemicize, he must expect to be exposed in a place where he neither supposes nor wishes it. Least of all let him venture to touch the Lutheran doctrine and church, to which he has belonged from childhood. Let him consider: "God's Word is Luther's doctrine and pure, it shall abide for evermore," even if the enemies boast: "it is all over with the Lutheran Church."

Fr. Besel,
German Ev. Luth. pastor at New Bedford.

We the undersigned hereby testify, according to the truth, that Pastor Friedrich Besel

1. has never laid before the congregation a constitution for adoption;

2. and has never taught concerning the Holy Supper as Pastor Steiner accuses him in the Missionsbote.

New Bedford, the 13th of July, 1850.

The Church Council of the German Ev. Luth. Zion's Congregation at Bedford:

Jakob Rinehart.

David Schlegel.

George Levengood.

"Charge them before the Lord that they strive not about words to no profit, but to the subverting of the hearers."

(2 Tim. 2, 14.)

I have a good conscience, writes Luther, if only I have taught nothing evil. Even the highest and most pious fathers in the church have spoken unfittingly, and indeed not seldom even in the highest articles of the faith; it is vain to dispute over expressions and words, when it is known that the doctrine itself is pure and clear. But the contentious weighers of words, whose whole conscientiousness and carefulness goes rather to what words they use, while they are little concerned about the matter itself, yea, teach nothing but what is wrong, these always find something in other men's books to rail at. They strain at gnats and swallow camels; the splinter of an unfitting little word they make a crime in the writings of others, while they themselves worship the beams of godless opinions in their own as something altogether divine. Let these alone count and delight in what is their own, as much as they will, ours may disgust them, but let them only not lay hands upon it.

(From a preface of Luther to the Latin edition of his Kirchenpostille of 1528. See: Unschuld. Nachr. of the year 1730, p. 186.)