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(From:
"Church-Membership: Addresses And Prayers at the Meetings of the Ev.
Lutheran Joint Congregation of St. Louis, Mo., and Its Board of Elders by
Dr. C.F.W. Walther" Translated by Rudolph Prange, CPH, St. Louis, MO.
1931, Page 11-14)
"By
signing the constitution of our congregation, you have shown that you
approve of it and have solemnly promised to abide by it. In the name of our
congregation I welcome you as voting members. Permit me to add a few
remarks.
Only
that is a good deed which is prompted by proper motives and performed in a
proper spirit. Alms, for
example, are good deeds only when given out of love, not under pressure or
merely to make people believe that you are a Christian.
Diligence in our earthly calling is a good deed only when it issues
from the desire to please God, who wills that we eat our daily bread in the
sweat of the brow, and not because you wish to gain riches.
The
same holds true with respect to joining a Christian congregation.
That, too, is a good deed only if we do so because it is Christ's
will that believers unite in proclaiming His Word, conducting public
worship, and building and spreading His kingdom.
The same step would be sinful if taken for the sake of earthly gain,
as we read of Simon, the sorcerer, who joined the Christian congregation in
Samaria
to enrich himself
in a material way. (Acts 8)
What
has just been said holds true also in the case of those who unite with a
truly Evangelical Lutheran congregation.
Also this step is a good deed only if they wish to join such a
congregation in preference to a congregation of another denomination because
they are convinced that only the
Evangelical
Lutheran
Church
teaches the pure,
unadulterated doctrine of God's Word. Were
some one, however, to seek voting membership in a Lutheran congregation
simply because he was born and reared in its midst, or to please his
parents, or because his friends are members of that congregation, or because
the location of its church makes it convenient to attend its services, he
would not perform a good deed, even though God may have led him into that
church for the purpose of making him a true Lutheran, in other words, an
orthodox Christian.
What
has been said emphasizes three factors that are essential in the make-up of
a genuine member of a Lutheran congregation.
1.
A genuine member of a Lutheran congregation must have a thorough
understanding of pure Lutheran doctrine or at least must desire to grow in
the knowledge of it. Such a one
will imitate the Bereans in searching the Scriptures daily; he will not lay
aside his Catechism when he has completed his elementary school-training,
but throughout his life continue to review it in order that he may
understand it better and become more thoroughly grounded in it.
He will read other good orthodox books and periodicals to become ever
more firmly established in the pure doctrine.
Hebrews 5 those Christians who are neglectful in this point are
censured. We read: "When
for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again
which be the first principles of the oracles of God and are become such as
have need of milk and not of strong meat."
2.
A member of a Lutheran congregation must be able to defend his faith and to
prove its correctness from God's Word. St.
Peter writes, 1 Pet.3:15: "Be ready always to give an answer to every
man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and
fear.' A sad state of affairs is
revealed when members of a Lutheran congregation, asked about their faith,
say, 'You will have to ask my pastor about that.'
3.
A member of a Lutheran congregation should be able to distinguish pure
doctrine from false doctrines. Only
spineless Lutherans can say: 'What
do I care about doctrinal controversies! They do not concern me in the
least. I'll let those who are
more learned than I am bother their heads about such matters.'
They even may be offended when they observe that religious leaders
engage in doctrinal disputes. A
genuine Lutheran will not forget that in the Epistle of Jude also lay
Christians are admonished 'earnestly to contend for the faith which was once
delivered unto the saints.' What
is more, Christ warns all Christians: 'Beware of false prophets.'
And
St. John
writes in his
first epistle: 'Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits
whether they are of God, because many false prophets are gone out into the
world.' It is a settled fact
that whoever is indifferent to false doctrine is indifferent also to pure
doctrine and his soul's salvation and has no right to bear the name Lutheran
and the name of Christ. "
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