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:
- "experiencing God in a three-fold manner."
- "three manners of being (God above us, God among us, God in
us),"
- "three levels of reality (nature, history, existence)"
- "three ways in which God reveals Himself"
- "three forms of address [from God] ('You shall!,' 'You may!,' 'You
can!')"
- "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.