Since March 4, 2002 Waldo Werning has sent the officers of Redeemer Lutheran Church at least 11 different letters totaling more than 60 pages of copy.

His total number of letters since claiming he was going to file charges on June 26, 2001, has exceeded the 200 pages of his book sent to every delegate of the 2001 LCMS Convention.

In his letters Werning flails, rants, and raves that Cascione has broken the Eighth Commandment for publicly refuting Werning's false doctrine and heresy about the Trinity. Werning keeps telling the officers of Redeemer Lutheran Church and the Michigan District that his doctrine of the Trinity is a personal matter of Matthew 18 with Pastor Cascione.

Werning has relegated the doctrine of the Trinity to a personal matter between "brothers," according to Matthew 18, rather than a matter of public confession in Matthew 16 where Christ asks, "Who do people say that I am?" By Werning's interpretation everything the disciples said that others said about Christ was a violation of Matthew 18.

If Werning has any hope of eternal salvation, Reclaim News challenges Werning, who is on the LCMS clergy roster, to tell the world that in Jesus Christ, God died on the Cross.

However, the politics are so thick, if he answers the question correctly, his book endorsed by "Jesus First" and the South Wisconsin District Officers, must be in error. Therefore, for Werning, it would be better to risk eternal damnation than to say, "In Christ, God (not a part of God) died on the Cross."

God cannot be divided. According to Martin Chemnitz, at the Baptism of Christ, the Voice who spoke from heaven was all of God. The Dove descending from heaven was all of God. Jesus being baptized was all of God, apart from whom there is no other God. Yet there are not three God's but one God.

Werning refuses to say that God died on the cross because according to his book, each Person of the Trinity is one third of God. Werning writes on page 34:

1. "experiencing God in a three-fold manner."
2. "three manners of being (God above us, God among us, God in us),"
3. "three levels of reality (nature, history, existence)"
4. "three ways in which God reveals Himself"
5. "three forms of address [from God] ('You shall!,' 'You may!,' 'You can!')"
6. "one of the three ways in which God has revealed Himself"

If there really is a God, all of Werning's statements above are false. The Athanasian Creed states: "Neither confounding the Persons nor dividing the Substance."

Werning has divided the substance of God. There is only one revelation, being, reality, and communication from and in God, not three, and no one; absolutely no one in the LCMS is experiencing God, not even "Jesus First" or the South Wisconsin District President. This is the kind of trash we have come to expect from members of the COP.

"Next to the article of the Holy Trinity this is the greatest mystery in heaven and on earth, as Paul says: 'Without controversy, great is the mystery of godliness, that God was manifest in the flesh, 1Tim. 3:16.' For since the Apostle Peter in clear words testifies (2 Peter 1:4) that we also, in whom Christ dwells only by grace, on account of that sublime mystery, are in Christ, 'partakers of the divine nature,' what kind of communion of the divine nature, then, must that be of which the apostle says that 'in Christ dwelt all the fullness of the Godhead bodily,'(Col. 2.9) so that God and man are one person?" (Luther Confessions, The Formula of Concord, Thor. Decl. VIII. Of the Person of Christ, par. 33-34 Concordia Triglotta, page 1027.)

In the second verse of "A Mighty Fortress" Luther writes about Christ, and "there is none other God."

"But if I believe that only the human nature suffered for me, then Christ would be a poor Savior for me, in fact, He himself would need a Savior." (Solid Declaration of Lutheran Confessions. Triglotta, Page 1027

"We Christians must know that if God is not also in the balance, and gives the weight, we sink to the bottom with our scale. By this I mean: If it were not to be said [if these things were not true], God has died for us, but only a man, we would be lost. But if 'God's death' and 'God died' lie in the scale of the balance, then He sinks down, and we rise up as a light, empty scale. But indeed He can also rise again or leap out of the scale; yet He could not sit in the scale unless He became a man like us, so that it could be said: 'God died'" 'God's passion,' 'God's blood,' 'God's death.' For in His nature God cannot die; but now that God and man are united in one person, it is correctly called God's death, when the man dies who is one thing or one person with God. ("Lutheran Confessions, Formula of Concord, Article VIII, Par 44, Concordia Triglotta pages 1029-1030")

We read nothing of "threes" or "a part of God" on the cross in the above. God cannot be divided.

We expect Werning's witnesses, who publicly supported his teaching at our last meeting at St. John's Lutheran Church in Fraser, Michigan, on February 26, 2002, (Rev. John Reusch, Rev. Toshio Okamoto, and past Chairman of the Council of District Presidents of the LCMS, Dr. John Heins) to be taking the same risk as Werning with their salvation for publicly supporting Werning's false doctrine of the Trinity.

This writer worships God crucified, dead, buried, and resurrected, not a part or a third of God, but all of God, apart from whom there is no other God. If this means breaking the Eighth Commandment in the LCMS, according to the South Wisconsin District President, I pray that I break it every day, because only those who break the South Wisconsin District President's Eighth Commandment will have eternal life.

May 16, 2002