Table of Contents
Of the Symbols of the Lutheran
Church
1.
We teach that the Holy Scriptures differ from all
other books in the world in that they are the Word of God. They are the Word of
God because the holy men of God who wrote the Scriptures wrote only that which
the Holy Ghost communicated to them by inspiration, 2 Tim. 3:16; 2 Pet. 1: 21. We
teach also that the verbal inspiration of the Scriptures is not a socalled "theological deduction," but that it is
taught by direct statements of the Scriptures, 2 Tim. 3:16; John 10:35; Rom.
3:2; 1 Cor. 2:13. Since the Holy Scriptures are the Word of God, it goes
without saying that they contain no errors or contradictions, but that they are
in all their parts and words the infallible truth, also in those parts which
treat of historical, geographical, and other secular matters, John 10:35.
2.
We furthermore teach regarding the Holy Scriptures
that they are given by God to the Christian Church for the foundation of faith,
Eph. 2:20. Hence the Holy Scriptures are the sole source from which all
doctrines proclaimed in the Christian Church must be taken and therefore, too,
the sole rule and norm by which all teachers and doctrines must be examined and
judged. -With the Confessions of our Church we teach also that the "rule
of faith" (analogia fidei)
according to which the Holy Scriptures are to be understood are the clear
passages of the Scriptures themselves which set forth the individual
doctrines. (Apology. Triglot, p. 441, @_ 60; Mueller,
p. 284). The rule of faith is not the man-made so-called "totality of
Scripture" ("Ganzes der
Schrift").
3.
We reject the doctrine which under the name of science
has gained wide popularity in the Church of our day that Holy Scripture is not
in all its parts the Word of God, but in part the Word of God and in part the
word of man and hence does, or at least, might, contain error. We reject this
erroneous doctrine as horrible and blasphemous, since it flatly contradicts
Christ and His holy apostles, sets up men as judges over the Word of God, and
thus overthrows the foundation of the Christian Church and its faith.
4. On the
basis of the Holy Scriptures we teach the sublime article of the Holy Trinity;
that is, we teach that the one true God, Deut 6:4; 1 Cor. 8:4, is the Father
and the Son and the Holy Ghost, three distinct persons, but of one and the same
divine essence, equal in power, equal in eternity, equal in majesty, because
each person possesses the one divine essence entire, Col. 2:9; Matt. 28:19. We
hold that all teachers and communions that deny the doctrine of the Holy
Trinity are outside the pale of the Christian Church. The Triune God is the God
who is gracious to man, John 3:16-18; 1 Cor. 12:3. Since the Fall no man can
believe in the "fatherhood" of God except he believe in the eternal
Son of God, who became man and reconciled us to God by His vicarious
satisfaction, 1 John 2:23; John 14:6. Hence we warn against Unitarianism, which in our country has to a great extent impenetrated the sects and is spread particularly also
through the influence of the lodges.
5. We
teach that God has created heaven and earth, and that in the manner and in the
space of time recorded in the Holy Scriptures, especially Gen 1 and 2, namely,
by His almighty creative word, and in six days. We reject every doctrine which
denies or limits the work of creation as taught in Scripture. In our days it is
denied or limited by those who assert, ostensibly in deference to science, that
the world came into existence through a process of evolution; that is, that it
has, in immense periods of time, developed more or less out of itself. Since no man was present when it pleased God to
create the world, we must look for a reliable account of creation to God's own
record, found in God's own book, the Bible. We accept God's own record with
full confidence and confess with Luther's Catechism: "I believe that God
has made me and all creatures.”
1.
We teach that the first man was not brutelike nor merely capable of intellectual development,
but that God created man in His own image, Gen. 1: 26, 27; Eph. 4: 24; Col. 3:
10, that is, in true knowledge of God and in true righteousness and holiness
and endowed with a truly scientific knowledge of nature, Gen. 2:19-23.
2.
We furthermore teach that sin came into the world by
the fall of the first man, as described Gen. 3. By this Fall not only he
himself, but also all his natural offspring have lost the original knowledge,
righteousness, and holiness, and thus all men are sinners already by birth,
dead in sins, inclined to all evil, and subject to the wrath of God, Rom.
5:12,18; Eph. 2:1-3. We teach also that men are unable, through any efforts of
their own or by the aid of culture and science," to reconcile themselves
to God and thus to conquer death and damnation.
8. We
teach that in the fulness of time the eternal Son of
God was made man by assuming, from the Virgin Mary through the operation of the
Holy Ghost, a human nature like unto ours, yet without sin, and receiving it
unto His divine person. Jesus Christ is therefore "true God, begotten of
the Father from eternity, and also true man, born of the Virgin Mary,"
true God and true man in one undivided and indivisible person The purpose of
this miraculous incarnation of the Son of God was that He might become the
Mediator between God and men, both fulfilling the divine Law and suffering and
dying in the place of mankind. In this manner God has reconciled the whole
sinful world unto Himself, Gal. 4:4,5; 3:13; 2 Cor.
5:18,19.
9. Since
God has reconciled the whole world unto Himself through the vicarious life and
death of His Son and has commanded that the reconciliation effected by Christ
be proclaimed to men in the Gospel, to the end that they may believe it, 2 Cor.
5:18, 19; Rom 1:5, therefore faith in Christ is the only way for men to obtain
Personal reconciliation with God, that is, forgiveness of sins, as both the Old
and the New Testament Scriptures testify, Acts 10: 43; John 3:16-18,36. By this
faith in Christ, through which men obtain the forgiveness of sins, is not meant
any human effort to fulfill the Law of God after the
example of Christ, but faith in the Gospel, that is, in the forgiveness of
sins, or justification, which was fully earned for us by Christ and is offered
in the Gospel. This faith justifies, not inasmuch as it is a work of man, but
inasmuch as it lays hold of the grace offered, the forgiveness of sins, Rom.
4:16.
1.
We teach that conversion consists in this, that a man,
having learned from the Law of God that he is a lost and condemned sinner, is
brought to faith in the Gospel, which offers him forgiveness of sins and
eternal salvation for the sake of Christ's vicarious satisfaction, Acts 11: 21;
Luke 24: 46,47; Acts 26:18.
2.
All men, since the Fall, are dead in sins, Eph. 2:1-3,
and inclined only to evil, Gen. 6:5; 8:21; Rom. 8:7. For this reason, and
particularly because men regard the Gospel of Christ, crucified for the sins of
the world, as foolishness, I Cor. 2:14, faith in the Gospel, or conversion to
God, is neither wholly nor in the least part the work of man, but the work of
God's grace and almighty power alone, Phil. 1:29; Eph. 2:8; 1:19;-Jer. 31:18. Hence
Scripture calls the faith of man, or his conversion, a raising
from the dead, Eph. 1:20; Col. 2:12, a being born of God, John 1: 12, 13, a new
birth by the Gospel, 1 Pet. 1: 23-25, a work of God like the creation of light
at the creation of the world, 2 Cor. 4:6.
3.
On the basis of these clear statements of the Holy
Scriptures we reject every kind of synergism, that is, the doctrine that
conversion is wrought not by the grace and power of God alone, but in part also
by the co-operation of man himself, by man's right conduct, his right attitude,
his right self-determination, his lesser guilt or less evil conduct as compared
with others, his refraining from willful resistance,
or anything else whereby man’s conversion and salvation is taken out of
the gracious hands of God and made to depend on what man does or leaves undone.
For this refraining from willful resistance or from
any kind of resistance is also solely a work of grace, which "changes
unwilling into willing men," Ezek36:26; Phil. 2:13. We reject also the
doctrine that man is able to decide for conversion through "powers
imparted by grace," since this doctrine presupposes that before conversion
man still possesses spiritual powers by which he can make the right use of such
"powers imparted by grace."
4.
On the other hand, we reject also the Calvinistic
perversion of the doctrine of conversion, that is, the doctrine that God does
not desire to convert and save all hearers of the Word, but only a portion of
them. Many hearers of the Word indeed remain unconverted and are not saved, not
because God does not earnestly desire their conversion and salvation, but
solely because they stubbornly resist the gracious operation of the Holy Ghost,
as Scripture teaches, Acts 7:51; Matt 23:37; Acts 13:46.
5.
As to the question why not all men are converted and
saved, seeing that God's grace is universal and all men are equally and utterly
corrupt, we confess that we cannot answer it. From Scripture we know only this:
A man owes his conversion and salvation, not to any lesser guilt or better
conduct on his part, but solely to the grace of God. But any man's
non-conversion is due to himself alone: it is the
result of his obstinate resistance against the converting operation of the Holy
Ghost, Hos. 13:9.
6. Our refusal to go
beyond what is revealed in these two Scriptural truths is not 'masked
Calvinism" ("Cryptocalvinism") but
precisely the Scriptural teaching of the Lutheran Church as it is presented in
detail in the Formula of Concord (Triglot, P. 1081,
@57-59, 60 b, 62, 63; M., P. 716 f.): "That one is hardened, blinded,
given over to a reprobate mind, while another, who is indeed in the same guilt,
is converted again, etc. -in these and similar questions Paul fixes a certain
limit to us how far we should go, namely, that in the one part we should
recognize God's judgment. For they are well-deserved
penalties of sins when
God so
punished a land or nation for despising His Word that the Punishment extends
also to their posterity, as is to be seen in the Jews. And thereby God in some
lands and persons exhibits His severity to those that are His in order to
indicate what we all would have well deserved and would be worthy and worth,
since we act wickedly in opposition to God's Word and often grieve the Holy
Ghost sorely; in order that we may live in the fear of God and acknowledge and
praise God's goodness, to the exclusion of, and contrary to, our merit in and
with us, to whom He gives His Word and with whom He leaves it and whom He does
not harden and reject.... And this His righteous, well-deserved judgment He
displays in some countries, nations, and persons in order that, when we are
placed alongside of them and compared with them (quam simillimi
illis deprehensi, i. e., and found to be most similar to them), we may learn
the more diligently to recognize and praise God's pure, unmerited grace in the
vessels of mercy. . . . When we proceed thus far in this article, we remain on
the right way, as it is written, Hos. 13:9: 'O Israel, thou hast destroyed
thyself; but in Me is thy help.' However, as regards
these things in this disputation which would soar too high and beyond these
limits, we should with Paul place the finger upon our lips and remember and
say,
9:20: 'O
man, who art thou that repliest against God?"' The
Formula of Concord describes the mystery which confronts us here not as a
mystery in man's heart (a "psychological" mystery), but teaches that,
when we try to understand why "one is hardened, blinded, given over to a
reprobate mind, while another, who is indeed in the same guilt, is converted
again," we enter the domain of the unsearchable judgments of God and ways
past finding out, which are not revealed to us in I-Iis
Word, but which we shall know in eternal life. 1 Cor. 13:12.
16.
Calvinists solve this mystery, which God has not revealed in His Word, by
denying the universality of grace; synergists, by denying that salvation is by
grace alone. Both solutions are utterly vicious, since they contradict
Scripture and since every Poor sinner stands in need of, and must cling to,
both the unrestricted universal grace and the unrestricted "by grace
alone," lest he despair and perish.
1.
Holy Scripture sums up all its teachings regarding the
love of God to the world of sinners, regarding the salvation wrought by Christ,
and regarding faith in Christ as the only way to obtain salvation, in the
article of justification. Scripture teaches that God has already declared the
whole world to be righteous in Christ, Rom. 5:19; 2 Cor. 5:18-21; Rom. 4:25;
that therefore not for the sake of their good works, but without the works of
the Law, by grace, for Christ's sake, He justifies, that is, accounts as
righteous, all those who believe in Christ, that is, believe, accept,
and rely on, the fact that for Christ's sake their sins are forgiven. Thus
the Holy Ghost testifies through St. Paul: "There is no difference; for
all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, being justified freely by
His grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus," Rom. 3: 23,24.
And again: "Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith,
without the deeds of the Law," Rom. 3:28.
2.
Through this doctrine alone Christ is given the honor due Him, namely, that through His holy life and
innocent suffering and death He is our Savior. And
through this doctrine alone can poor sinners have the abiding comfort that God
is assuredly gracious to them. We reject as apostasy from the Christian
religion all doctrines whereby man's own works and
merit are mingled into the article of justification before God. For the
Christian religion is the faith that we have forgiveness of sins and salvation
through faith in Christ Jesus, Acts 10:43.
3.
We reject as apostasy from the Christian religion not
only the doctrine of the Unitarians, who promise the grace of God to men on the
basis of their moral efforts; not only the gross work-doctrine of the papists,
who expressly teach that good works are necessary to obtain justification; but
also the doctrine of the synergists, who indeed use the terminology of the
Christian Church and say that man is justified "by faith," "by
faith alone," but again mix
human works into the article of justification by ascribing to man a
co-operation with God in the kindling of faith and thus stray into papistic territory.
20. Before
God only those works are good which are done for the glory of God and the good
of man, according to the rule of the divine Law. Such works, however, no man
performs unless he first believes that God has forgiven him his sins and has
given him eternal life by grace, for Christ's sake, without any works of his
own, John 15:4,5. We reject as a great folly the
assertion, frequently made in our day, that works must be placed in the fore,
and "faith in dogmas" -meaning the Gospel of Christ Crucified for the
sins of the world must be relegated to the rear. Since good works never precede
faith, but are always and in every instance the result of faith in the Gospel,
it is evident that the only means by which we Christians can become rich in
good works (and God would have us to be rich in good works, Titus 2:14) is
unceasingly to remember the grace of God which we have received in Christ,
Rom.12:1; 2 Cor. 8:9. Hence we reject as unchristian and foolish any attempt to
produce good works by the compulsion of the Law or through carnal motives.
1.
Although God is present and operates everywhere
throughout all creation and the whole earth is therefore full of the temporal
bounties and blessings of God, Col. 1:17; Acts 17:28, 14:17, still we hold with
Scripture that God offers and communicates to men the spiritual blessings
purchased by Christ, namely, the forgiveness of sins and the treasures and
gifts connected therewith, only through the external means of grace ordained by
Him. These means of grace are the Word of the Gospel, in every form in which it
is brought to man, and the Sacraments of Holy Baptism
and of the Lord's Supper. The Word of the Gospel promises and applies the grace
of God, works faith and thus regenerates man, and gives the Holy Ghost, Acts
20:24; Rom. 10:17; 1 Pet. 1:23; Gal. 3:2. Baptism, too, is applied for the
remission of sins and is therefore a washing of regeneration and renewing of
the Holy Ghost, Acts 2:38; 22:16; Titus 3:5. Likewise the object of the Lord's
Supper, that is, of the ministration of the body and blood of Christ, is none
other than the communication and sealing of the forgiveness of sins, as the
words declare: "Given for you," and: "Shed for you for the
remission of sins," Luke 22:19, 20; Matt. 26:28, and: "This cup is
the New Testament in My blood," 1 Cor. 11:23; Jer. 31:31-34 ("New
Covenant").
2.
Since it is only through the external means ordained
by Him that God has promised to communicate the grace and salvation purchased
by Christ, the Christian Church must not remain at home with the means of grace
entrusted to it, but go into the whole world with the preaching of the Gospel
and the administration of the Sacraments, Matt. 28: 19, 20; Mark 16:15, 16. For
the same reason also the churches at home should never forget that there is no
other way of winning souls for the Church and keeping them with it than the
faithful and diligent use of the divinely ordained means of grace. Whatever
activities do not either directly apply the Word of God or subserve
such application we condemn as "new methods," unchurchly
activities, which do not build, but harm, the Church.
3.
We reject as a dangerous error the doctrine, which
disrupted the Church of the Reformation, that the grace and the Spirit of God
are communicated not through the external means ordained by Him, but by an
immediate operation of grace. This erroneous doctrine bases the forgiveness of
sins, or justification, upon a fictitious "infused grace," that is,
upon a quality of man, and thus again establishes the work-doctrine of the
papists.
24. We
believe that there is one holy Christian Church on earth, the Head of which is Christ and which is gathered, preserved, and governed by
Christ through the Gospel.
The
members of the Christian Church are the Christians, that is, all those who have
despaired of their own righteousness before God and believe that God forgives
their sins for Christ's sake. The Christian Church, in the proper sense of the
term, is composed of believers only, Acts 5:14; 26:18; which means that no
person in whom the Holy Ghost has wrought faith in the Gospel, or -which is the
same thing -in the doctrine of justification, can be divested of his membership
in the Christian Church; and, on the other hand, that no person in whose heart
this faith does not dwell can be invested with such membership. All
unbelievers, though they be in external communion with the Church and even hold
the office of teacher or any other office in the Church, are not members of the
Church, but, on the contrary, dwelling-places and instruments of Satan, Eph.
2:2. This is also the teaching of our Lutheran Confessions: "It is
certain, however, that the wicked are in the power of the devil and members of
the kingdom of the devil, as Paul teaches, Eph. 2:2, when he says that 'the
devil now worketh in the children of
disobedience,"' etc. (Apology. Triglot, p. 231, @_ 16;
M.,
p. 154.)
1.
Since it is by faith in the Gospel alone that men
become members of the Christian Church, and since this faith cannot be seen by
men, but is known to God alone, 1 Kings 8:39; Acts 1: 24; 2 Tim. 2:19,
therefore the Christian Church on earth is invisible, Luke 17:20, and will
remain invisible till Judgment Day, Col. 3:3, 4. In our day some Lutherans
speak of two sides of the Church, taking the means of grace to be its
"visible side." It is true, the means of grace are necessarily
related to the Church, seeing that the Church is created and preserved through
them. But the means of grace are not for that reason a part of the Church; for
the Church, in the proper sense of the word, consists only of believers, Eph.
2:19,20; Acts 5:14. Lest we abet the notion that the Christian Church in the
proper sense of the term is an external institution, we shall continue to call
the means of grace the "marks" of the Church. Just as wheat is to be
found only where it has been sown, so the Church can be found only where the
Word of God is in use.
2.
We teach that this Church, which is the invisible
communion of all believers, is to be found not only in those external church
communions which teach the Word of God purely in every part, but also where,
along with error, so much of the Word of God still remains that men may be
brought to the knowledge of their sins and to faith in the forgiveness of sins,
which Christ has gained for all men, Mark 16:16; Samaritans: Luke 17:16; John
4:25.
3.
10: 16,
but also of churches in the plural, that is, of local churches, as in 1 Cor.
16: 19; 1: 2; Acts 8: 1: the churches of Asia, the
1.
On Church-Fellowship. -Since God ordained that His
Word only, without the admixture of human doctrine, be taught and believed in
the Christian Church, 1 Pet. 4: 11; John 8:31,32; 1 Tim. 6:3,4, all Christians
are required by God to discriminate between orthodox and heterodox
church-bodies, Matt. 7:15, to have church-fellowship only with orthodox
church-bodies, and, in case they have strayed into heterodox church-bodies, to
2.
leave them, Rom. 16:17.
We repudiate unionism, that is, church-fellowship with the adherents of false
doctrine, as disobedience to God's command, as causing divisions in the Church,
Rom. 16:17; 2 John 9,10, and as involving the constant danger of losing the
Word of God entirely, 2 Tim. 2:17-21.
2.
The orthodox character of a church is established not by its mere name nor by its outward acceptance of, and
subscription to, an orthodox creed, but by the doctrine which is actually
taught in its pulpits, in its theological seminaries, and in its Publications. On
the other hand, a church does not forfeit its orthodox character through the
casual intrusion of errors, provided these are combated and eventually removed
by means of doctrinal discipline, Acts 20:30; 1 Tim. 1: 3.
3.
The Original and True Possessors of All Christian
Rights and Privileges. -Since the Christians are the Church, it is self-evident
that they alone originally possess the spiritual gifts and rights which Christ
has gained for, and given to, I-!is Church. Thus St. Paul reminds all
believers: "All things are yours," 1 Cor. 3: 21, 22, and Christ
Himself commits to all believers the keys of the kingdom of heaven, Matt.
16:13-19; 18:17-20; John 20:22, 23, and commissions all believers to preach the
Gospel and to administer the Sacraments, Matt. 28:19,20; 1 Cor. 11:23-25. Accordingly,
we reject all doctrines by which this spiritual power or any part thereof is
adjudged as originally vested in certain individuals or bodies, such as the
Pope, or the bishops, or the order of the ministry, or the secular lords, or
councils, or synods, etc. The officers of the Church publicly administer their
offices only by virtue of delegated powers, conferred on them by the original
possessors of such powers, and such administration remains under the
supervision of the latter, Col. 4:17. Naturally all Christians have also the
right and the duty to judge and decide matters of doctrine, not according to
their own notions, of course, but according to the Word of God, 1 John 4: 1; I
Pet. 4: 11.
1.
By the public ministry we mean the office by which the
Word of God is preached and the Sacraments are administered by order and in the
name of a Christian congregation. Concerning this office we teach that it is a
divine ordinance; that is, the Christians of a certain locality must apply the
means of grace not only privately and within the circle of their families nor
merely in their common intercourse with fellow-Christians, John 5:39; Eph. 6:4;
Col. 3:16, but they are also required, by the divine order, to make provision
that the Word of God be publicly preached in their midst, and the Sacraments
administered according to the institution of Christ, by persons qualified for
such work, whose qualifications and official functions are exactly defined in
Scripture, Titus 1:5; Acts 14:23; 20:28; 2 Tim. 2:2.
2.
Although the office of the ministry is a divine
ordinance, it possesses no other power than the power of the Word of God, 1
Pet. 4: 11; that is to say, it is the duty of Christians to yield
unconditional obedience to the office of the ministry whenever, and as long as,
the minister proclaims to them the Word of God, Heb. 13:17; Luke 10: 16If,
however, the minister, in his teachings and injunctions, were to go beyond the
Word of God, it would be the duty of Christians not to obey, but to disobey
him, so as to remain faithful to Christ, Matt. 23:8. Accordingly, we reject the
false doctrine ascribing to the office of the ministry the right to demand obedience
and submission in matters which Christ has not commanded.
3. Regarding
ordination we teach that it is not a divine, but a commendable ecclesiastical
ordinance. (Smalcald
Articles. Triglot, p. 525,
@70; M., p. 342.)
34.
Although both Church and State are ordinances of God, yet they must not be
commingled. Church and State have entirely different aims. By the Church, God
would save men, for which reason the Church is called the "mother" of
believers, Gal. 4:26. By the State, God would maintain external order among
men, "that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and
honesty," 1 Tim. 2:2. It follows that the means which Church and State
employ to gain their ends are entirely different. The Church may not employ any
other means than the preaching of the Word of God, John 18:11,36;
2 Cor. 10: 4. The State, on the other hand, makes laws bearing on civil matters
and is empowered to employ for their execution also the sword and other
corporal punishments, Rom. 13:4. Accordingly we condemn the policy of those who
would have the power of the State employed "in the interest of the
Church" and who thus turn the Church into a secular dominion; as also of
those who, aiming to govern the State by the Word of God, seek to turn the
State into a Church.
35. By
election of grace we mean this truth, that all those who by the grace of God
alone, for Christ's sake, through the means of grace, are brought to faith, are
justified, sanctified, and preserved in faith here in time, that all these have
already from eternity been endowed by God with faith, justification,
sanctification, and preservation in faith, and this for the same reason,
namely, by grace alone, for Christ's sake, and by way of the means of grace. That
this is the doctrine of Holy Scripture is evident from Eph. 1:3-7; 2 Thess. 2:13,14;
Acts 13:48; Rom. 8:28-30; 2 Tim. 1:9; Matt. 24:22-24 (cp. Form. of Conc. Triglot,
p. 1065, @
5, 8, 23; M., p. 705).
1.
Accordingly we reject as an anti-Scriptural error the
doctrine that not alone the grace of God and the merit of Christ are the cause
of the election of grace, but that God has, in addition, found or regarded
something good in us which prompted or caused Him to elect us, this being
variously designated as "good works right conduct," "proper
self-determination refraining from willful
resistance," etc. Nor does Holy Scripture know of an election "by
foreseen faith in view of faith," as though the faith of the elect were to
be placed before their election; but according to Scripture the faith which the
elect have in time belongs to the spiritual blessings with which God has
endowed them by His eternal election. For Scripture teaches, Acts 13:48:
"And as many as were ordained unto eternal life believed." Our Lutheran
Confession also testifies (Triglot, p. 1065, @_ 8;
M., p. 705): "The internal election of God however, not only foresees and
foreknows the salvation of the elect, but is also, from the gracious will and
pleasure of God in Christ Jesus, a cause which procures, works, helps, and
promotes our salvation and what pertains thereto; and upon this our salvation
is so founded that the gates of hell cannot prevail against it, Matt. 16:18, as
is written John 10: 28: 'Neither shall any man pluck My sheep out of My hand';
and again, Acts 13:48: 'And as many as were ordained to eternal life
believed."'
2.
But as earnestly as we maintain that there is an
election of grace, or a predestination to salvation,
so decidedly do we teach, on the other hand, that there is no election of
wrath, or predestination to damnation. Scripture plainly reveals the truth that
the love of God for the world of lost sinners is universal, that is, that it
embraces all men without exception, that Christ has fully reconciled all men
unto God, and that God earnestly desires to bring all men to faith, to preserve
them therein, and thus to save them, as Scripture testifies, 1 Tim. 2:4:
"God will have all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the
truth." No man is lost because God has predestinated
him to eternal damnation.-Eternal election is a cause why the elect are brought
to faith in time, Acts 13:48; but election is not a cause why men remain
unbelievers when they hear the Word of God. The reason assigned by Scripture
for this sad fact is that these men judge themselves unworthy of everlasting
life, putting the Word of God from them and obstinately resisting the Holy
Ghost, whose earnest will it is to bring also them to repentance and faith by
means of the Word, Acts 13:46; 7:51; Matt 23:37.
1. To be sure, it is
necessary to observe the Scriptural distinction between the election of grace
and the universal will of grace. This
universal gracious will of God
embraces all
2.
men; the election of grace, however, does not embrace
all, but only a definite number, whom "God hath from the beginning chosen
to salvation," 2 Thess. 2:13, the 94 remnant," the
"seed" which "the Lord left," Rom. 9:27-29, the
“election,” Rom. 11: 7; and while the universal will of grace is
frustrated in the case of most men, Matt 22:14; Luke 7:30, the election of
grace attains its end with all whom it embraces, Rom. 8:28-30. Scripture,
however, while distinguishing between the universal will of grace and the
election of grace, does not place the two in opposition to each other. On the
contrary, it teaches that the grace dealing with those who are lost is
altogether earnest and fully efficacious for conversion. Blind reason indeed
declares these two truths to be contradictory; but we impose silence on our
reason. The seeming disharmony will disappear in the light of heaven, I Cor.
13:12.
3.
Furthermore, by election of grace, Scripture does not
mean that one part of God's counsel of salvation according to which He will
receive into heaven those who persevere in faith unto the end, but, on the
contrary, Scripture means this, that God, before the foundation of the world,
from Pure grace, because of the redemption of Christ, has chosen for His own a
definite number of persons Out of the corrupt mass and has determined to bring
them, through Word and Sacrament. to faith and
salvation.
4.
Christians can and should be assured of their eternal ,election. This is evident from the fact that
Scripture addresses them as the chosen ones and comforts them with their
election, Eph. 1:4; 2 Thess. 2:13. This assurance of one's personal election,
however, springs only from faith in the Gospel, from the assurance that God so
loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in
Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not His Son into
the world to condemn the world; on the contrary, through the life, suffering,
and death of I-Ls Son He fully reconciled the whole world of sinners unto
Himself. Faith in this truth leaves no room for the fear that God might still harbor thoughts of wrath and damnation concerning us. Scripture
inculcates that in Rom. 8:32,33: "He that spared
not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him
also freely give us all things? Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's
elect? It is God that justifieth." Luther's
pastoral advice is therefore in accord with Scripture: "Gaze upon the
wounds of Christ and the blood shed for you; there predestination will shine
forth." (
41. We
teach that in the New Testament God has abrogated the Sabbath and all the
holy-days prescribed for the Church of the Old Covenant, so that neither
"the keeping of the Sabbath nor of any other day" nor the observance
of at least one specific day of the seven days of the week is ordained or
commanded by God, Col 2:16; Rom. 14:5 (Augsburg Confession. Triglot,
p. 91, @_ 51-60; M., p. 66).
The
observance of Sunday and other church festivals is an ordinance of the Church,
made by virtue of Christian liberty. (
42. With the
Over
against this, Scripture clearly teaches, and we teach accordingly, that the
kingdom of Christ on earth will remain under the cross until the end of the
world, Acts 14:22; John 16:33; 18:36; Luke 9:23; 14:27; 17:20-37; 2 Tim. 4:18;
Heb. 12:28; Luke 18:8; that the second visible coming of the Lord will be His
final advent, His coming to judge the quick and the dead, Matt. 24:29, 30;
25:31; 2 Tim. 4: 1; 2 Thess. 2:8; Heb. 9:26-28; that there will be but one
resurrection of the dead, John 5:28; 6:39, 40; that the time of the Last Day
is, and will remain, unknown, Matt. 24:42; 25:13; Mark 13: 32, 37; Acts 1: 7,
which would not be the case if the Last Day were to come a thousand years after
the beginning of a millennium; and that there will be no general conversion, a
conversion en masse, of the Jewish nation, Rom.
11: 7; 2
Cor. 3:14; Rom. 11: 25; 1 Thess. 2:16.
According
to these clear passages of Scripture we reject the whole of Millennialism,
since it not only contradicts Scripture, but also engenders a false conception
of the kingdom of Christ, turns the hope of Christians upon earthly goals, I
Cor. 15:19; Col. 3:2, and leads them to look upon the Bible as an obscure book.
43. As to
the Antichrist we teach that the prophecies of the Holy Scriptures concerning
the Antichrist, 2 Thess. 2: 3-12; 1 John 2:18, have been fulfilled in the Pope
of Rome and his dominion. All the features of the Antichrist as drawn in these
prophecies, including the most abominable and horrible ones, for example, that
the Antichrist "as God sitteth in the temple of
God," 2 Thess. 2:4; that he anathematizes the very heart of the Gospel of
Christ, that is, the doctrine of the forgiveness of sins by grace alone, for
Christ's sake alone, through faith alone, without any merit or worthiness in
man (Rom. 3:20-28; Gal. 2:16); that he recognizes only those as members of the
Christian Church who bow to his authority; and that, like a deluge, he had
inundated the whole Church with his antichristian doctrines till God revealed hirn through the Reformation these very features are the
outstanding characteristics of the Papacy. (Cf. Smalcald Articles. Triglot,
p. 515, @_ 39 to . 1; p. 401, _ 45;
M., pp. 336, 258.)
Hence we
subscribe to the statement of our Confessions that the Pope is "the very
Antichrist." (Smalcald
Articles. Triglot, p. 475, @_ 10; M, p. 308.)
44. Those
questions in the domain of Christian doctrine may be termed open questions
which Scripture answers either not at all or not clearly. Since neither an
individual nor the Church as a whole is permitted to develop or augment the
Christian doctrine, but are rather ordered and commanded by God to continue in
the doctrine of the apostles, 2 Thess. 2:15; Acts 2:42, open questions must
remain open questions. -Not to be included in the number of
open questions are the following: the doctrine of the Church and the
Ministry, of Sunday, of Chiliasrn, and of Antichrist,
these doctrines being clearly defined in Scripture.
1.
We accept as our confessions all the symbols contained
in the Book of Concord of the year 1580. -The symbols of the
2.
Since the Christian Church cannot make doctrines, but
can and should simply profess the doctrine revealed in Holy Scripture, the
doctrinal decisions of the symbols are binding upon the conscience not because
our Church has made them nor because they are the outcome of doctrinal
controversies, but only because they are the doctrinal decisions of Holy
Scripture itself.
3.
Those desiring to be admitted into the public ministry
of the
4.
The confessional obligation covers all doctrines, not
only those that are treated ex professor but also those that are merely
introduced in support of other doctrines.
The
obligation does not extend to historical statements, "purely exegetical
questions," and other matters not belonging to the doctrinal content of
the symbols. All doctrines of the symbols are based on clear statements of Scripture.