Dau Two

Lectures on Dr. Graebner’s Outlines Volume II

By Prof. W. H. T. Dau

LECTURES on DR. GRAEBNER’S OUTLINES

Edited by Ethan and Gene Urtel

The Rivertown Press
Saint Paul
2025

While this revised book remains the property of its authors, it purposely has not been copyrighted.

Therefore, you may copy freely the contents of this revision.

Table of Contents

Soteriology…………………………………………………………………….. 3
§130. Definition……………………………………………………………… 3
§131. The prompting cause in Soteriology. ……………………….. 6
§132. The Instrumental Cause. ………………………………………. 20
§133. The Gospel. ………………………………………………………… 25
§134. The Sacraments in General. ………………………………….. 38
§135. The Sacraments of the Christian Church. ……………….. 50
§136. Baptism. …………………………………………………………….. 50
§137. The Lord’s Supper. ………………………………………………. 70
§138. Efficacy and Resistibility of the Means of Grace. ……… 94
§139. Operations of the Holy Spirit. ……………………………….. 95
§140. Vocation. ……………………………………………………………. 96
§141. Effects of the Call. ……………………………………………….. 98
§142. Regeneration. ……………………………………………………. 100
§143. Conversion. ………………………………………………………. 102
§144. Conversion and Preparatory Acts. ……………………….. 105
§145. Conversion Purely the Work of God. ……………………. 107
§146. Act of Faith. ………………………………………………………. 109
§147. State of Faith. ……………………………………………………. 116
§148. Justification. ……………………………………………………… 117
§149. Consequences of Justification. …………………………….. 125
§150. Activity of Faith. ………………………………………………… 127
§151. Renovation or Sanctification. ………………………………. 127
§152. Mode of Sanctification. ………………………………………. 129
§153. Progressive Sanctification. ………………………………….. 130
§154. Good Works. …………………………………………………….. 131
§155. Imputed and Inherent Righteousness Compared. ….. 135
§156. Sanctification Imperfect in this Life. …………………….. 137
§157. The Invisible Church. ………………………………………….. 139
§158. Visible Churches. ……………………………………………….. 143
§159. The Marks of the Church…………………………………….. 146
§160. Orthodox Church. ………………………………………………. 148
§161. Rights of the Church Where Vested……………………… 148
§162. The Rights and Powers of the Church. ………………….. 151
§163. The Ministerial Office. ………………………………………… 151
§164. The Ministry: How Conferred……………………………… 153
§165. Ordination. ……………………………………………………….. 155
§166. Qualifications for the Ministry. ……………………………. 156
§167. Equality of Ministers. …………………………………………. 158
§168. Assistant Functionaries in the Church. …………………. 159
§169. The Validity of Ministerial Functions. …………………… 161
§170. Erring Churches. ………………………………………………… 161
§171. End and Aim of the Ministry. ………………………………. 163
§172. The Church Militant and Triumphant. ………………….. 164
§173. Predestination and Salvation of the Elect. …………….. 164
§174. Eschatology. ……………………………………………………… 168
§175. Temporal Death. ……………………………………………….. 168
§176. The Death of the Wicked. …………………………………… 170
§177. The Death of Believers. ………………………………………. 171
§178. The Last Generation. ………………………………………….. 183
§179. The Signs of the Last Times. ………………………………… 184
§180. The Purpose of the Second Advent………………………. 198
§181. The Resurrection of the Dead. …………………………….. 204
§182. The Final Judgment. …………………………………………… 209
§183. The End of the World. ………………………………………… 213
§184. Eternal Damnation. ……………………………………………. 214
§185. Eternal Life. ………………………………………………………. 220

Soteriology.
§130. Definition

Soteriology by the force of the term is an account of “sootäri,” salvation. But have we not had that in the chapter of Christology, especially in the divisions of the states and of the office of Christ? True the entire salvation as wrought out by the Savior (“sootär”) for all mankind was there exhibited. And that was in itself a complete salvation. God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them, 2nd Corinthians 5:19. Christ has by His divine living and dying rendered perfect satisfaction to divine justice. Any person who denies this and claims that we must render a satisfaction for our sins besides that which has been rendered by Christ, and that the redemption of the sinner is completed only by the sinner himself rendering such satisfaction, teaches a doctrine contrary to Scripture.
Nevertheless, God has ordained that, in order to actually obtain for himself the salvation which Christ has procured for all, something must be done for each and every sinner individually if he is to be personally benefitted by the salvation of Christ. In the first place the sinner must be told that he is saved, not that he will be saved, provided that he do this or that, comply with this condition or that; nor that we hope that he may ultimately find himself in heaven, but that he is now – this very moment – a righteous being in the eyes of God, because of the merit of the atoning sacrifice of Christ, which was offered to God for him. In order to convey this intelligence to sinners, God, after reconciling the world unto Himself “hath committed unto us,” says one of His salvation messengers, “the word of reconciliation,” 2nd Corinthians 5:19. That salvation which Christ put into acts, deeds of active and passive obedience, God had put into a word. And this word He has entrusted to men, whom He has made His “ambassadors,” that they should go out among men, their fellowmen, all of whom have been reconciled to God by Christ, and tell them about it, and “beseech them,” i.e., earnestly exhort them for
Christ’s sake not to allow this glorious reconciliation to become of none effect through their refusal to acknowledge and accept it, 2nd Corinthians 5:20. In the second place the sinner to whom this news of the atonement, “this testimony of Christ,” is brought, must be led by God’s gracious influence to appropriate it, to receive it as a gift intended for him, to obtain it as an inheritance set aside for him, and to become personally enriched from this treasure of the grace of God which is thrown open to all the world, 1st Corinthians 1:4-7; John 1:16; Ephesians 1:7, 8, 11.
Hence after the completion of the work of Christ for, and in the place of sinners, there is a work of God, performed in and upon the sinners redeemed by Christ. The account in the Scriptures given of this latter work we call soteriology. If God would not extend the word of reconciliation to the redeemed, and if He would not lead the redeemed to believe that they are redeemed, the sinners would be lost in spite of their having been redeemed.
That is the difference – and at the same time the connection – between the chapter of Christology and that of Soteriology: Christology treats of the acquisition, Soteriology of the application of salvation. Quenstedt, accordingly has inscribed this entire chapter: de gratia applicatrix, i.e., of applying grace. Or we might state the difference thus: Christology shows how salvation was obtained for, Soteriology, how it was obtained by the sinner; or, Christology treats of the salvation of the entire body of sinful mankind, of sinners en masse; Soteriology, of the salvation of the individual sinner; or, Christology shows how the blessings of salvation were procured, Soteriology, how they are distributed to, and possessed and enjoyed by the sinners.
Thus we come to understand the twofold reconciliation in 2nd Corinthians 5:19, 20. Those already reconciled are asked to become reconciled. There is a reconciliation which has already taken place and another which is still to be effected. The former reconciliation is the basis for the latter: if God had not reconciled the world, there would be no reconciliation, no word of reconciliation and no invitation to the individual sinner to become reconciled. Each reconciliation effects the sinner in an individual way: in the former reconciliation he was reconciled by his representative Christ, in the latter he becomes personally reconciled by an act of the Holy Spirit. But this personal reconciliation must not be regarded as a supplement or reinforcement of the reconciliation effected by Christ. Nor must the personal reconciliation be represented, as is sometimes done in our day, as a repetition in the sinner of that reconciliation which was effected by Christ outside of the sinner. The second, or personal, reconciliation is nothing but the application of Christ’s merits to, or their appropriation by, the sinner. Christ did not, by the reconciliation which He effected, show the sinner as by an example what would be a good way in which the sinner could effect his own reconciliation, but He actually reconciled the sinner, and the sinner becomes personally reconciled to God by believing that he has been reconciled to God by Christ.
Accordingly, Scripture describes this second or personal reconciliation as a “giving” and “receiving,” as an “enriching” and “obtaining,” and as an “having” and “being confirmed in” the possession of something that has come out of the store-house of the “fulness of Christ,” and that was certainly there for the sinner before the sinner actually became owner of it.
Luther is a master in setting forth this truth. He says: “It is not our doing, nor can it be merited by our work; it is already at hand, donated and offered to us; only you must open your mouth, or rather your heart, and hold still and let God fill it, Psalm 81:11.” Again: “This, then, is the benefit we derive from the suffering and resurrection of Christ, viz., that He has not done this for Himself, but for the whole world, that He has crushed under His foot the devil and my sins, which rested on Him on Good Friday, so that the devil now flees at the name of Christ. Would you make use of these great blessings? Well He has given them to you; only do Him the honor to accept them with thanks.”
We are, on the one hand, laying all possible stress on the redemption accomplished by Christ. For the sects entertain this view of redemption: Christ, they say, has by His suffering and death, accomplished this much, that God is now inclined to forgive men their sins, provided they change their conduct and are converted. This is utterly false. The fact is, God is perfectly reconciled by the work of Christ, and has expressed His satisfaction in the word of reconciliation, the Gospel. This word men are to accept and believe. God is not moved to be gracious to them by their act of believing, but He tells them while they are yet unbelievers that He is gracious unto them. When Christ died, the whole world was reconciled to God. God pronounced a world-wide reconciliation the day He raised Christ from the dead. The resurrection of Christ is the justification of the world, its objective justification. When Christ was pronounced free from guilt, all the world was so pronounced.
On the other hand, we emphasize the necessity of subjective justification. God sends His message of general pardon to the sinner by means of the Gospel, and tells the sinner: You are reconciled to me! By believing this message the sinner becomes subjectively justified. To believe the Gospel means to accept the reconciliation accomplished by Christ, to receive the salvation acquired and offered by Christ. On this fact as its basis rests the doctrine of absolution; we absolve sinners, because we know that God has absolved them. The knowledge of these facts must fill every preacher with a holy enthusiasm to go out, beseeching men: Be ye reconciled; see, God is reconciled!
The materials which are usually offered under the head of Soteriology in the works of dogmaticians, were not elaborated in such systematic form by the older dogmaticians of our church. Luther never wrote a Dogmatik, and yet, he and his contemporaries were the most powerful expounders of soteriological truths which the world has seen since the day of the apostle Paul. In the works of Melanchthon (Loci) and in commentators like Chemnitz, much soteriological matter is found in the locus de libero arbitrio. As to order – the early dogmaticians usually enumerate the soteriological acts of God thus: faith, good works, repentance, confession. The advantage in following this order is that faith and justification are given a very prominent place, and that sanctification is fully described by the zeal of good works and daily renewal. The later dogmaticians attempted a more minute ordering of the soteriological acts. Quenstedt’s enumeration is: vocation, illumination, conversion and regeneration, mystic union and renovation; to these are attached as an appendix: faith and good works (penitence). Baier has this order: faith in Christ, regeneration and conversion, justification, renovation, good works. Hollaz arranges thus: calling, illumination, converting,
regenerating, justifying, indwelling, renewing, preserving, glorifying grace.
Our textbook differs from both the earlier and the later Lutheran dogmaticians, as regards the arrangement of the materials of Soteriology. After the brief description of the contents of the term Soteriology in §130, Dr. Graebner presents the moving cause for all that is to be discussed in this chapter, the gratia applicatrix of Quenstedt, §131. Next he shows the instruments with which the cause works, media gratiae, §132-138; thirdly, the various acts and effects of this grace, operationes grationes, ordo salutis, §139-156; fourthly, the divine asylum, in which an orderly and continuous operation for applying grace is secured here on earth, namely the regnum gratiae, the Church, §157-172; and lastly, the antemundane decree of God, which is being executed through applying grace, the praedestinatio gratiae, §173.

§131. The prompting cause in Soteriology.

1. In any soteriological action of God the sinner is to be viewed in the first place as the subiectum operationis. The personal reconciliation of the sinner with God, who was reconciled to all men universally by the work of Christ, is something in which the sinner is effected by God, something which God effects in the sinner. In the act of applying to himself or appropriating, the saving merits of Christ, the sinner, indeed, must act personally; but in order that he may act, God must act upon him; hence Soteriology in its opening chapters must place before us the sinner as acted upon by God, rather than as acting. The sinner does not effect either wholly or in part, the application of the saving merits of Christ to himself, but suffers it. For the sinner is over and against the initial soteriological acts of God, incapable of performing, or helping to perform any act, by which he comes into personal possession of the merits of Christ. He cannot “say that Jesus is the Lord,” viz., that Jesus is the divine Master who purchased him for His own subject with His own blood, 1st Corinthians 12:3, for the sinner is “dead in sins,” and must be “quickened” into life, Ephesians 2:5, 8. God, in particular, the Holy Ghost, quickens him. And the question now arises: What moves God to do this? The answer of Scripture is: Grace, “charis.”
The grace of God was first presented for our study among the essential attributes of God, §42. It was next mentioned as the cause prompting God in His eternal decrees of salvation and predestination, §50, 51. It had not been especially mentioned at the opening of the chapter on Christology. But our author tells us now that the entire work, which he has described in that chapter, has flown from the grace of God and all the passages which he has cited under section 3 of this paragraph prove that grace is also the scriptural background and foundation for all true teaching regarding the Saviour and His work. But now that we are to study the last acts by which God rescues the sinner from his state of natural misery since the fall, and are told again that also in these acts grace plays a most important part, it is necessary to study this divine element. “Inter principia et causas salutis hominum… primum locum obtinet gratia Dei,” Baier. This means, whatever there may be, by which our salvation is secured to us sinners, that depends on and flows from grace. Grace, then, is to be studied now, “non quatenus ad ‘theologiam’… sed ad ‘oikonomian’ pertinet.” i.e., not so far as it is in God, but so far
as it approaches us and carries out the economy of grace which God has adopted for our salvation. While God is the causa efficiens of our salvation, grace is the causa impulsiva, that which prompts God to enter upon and carry out the plan of salvation viewed as a whole and in every particular instance. There is nothing prior to His own grace that prompts God to save.
But can God be prompted? Not in the sense that He is put under a constraint from some outside source. God never answers to force or to the Law of necessity. Baier, accordingly, calls attention to the fact that it is only nostra concipiendi modo that we can say “Deus movetur.” God is the absolutely passionless “Being,” and nothing can ever occur in Him which would imply a change in His serene equanimity. Accordingly, Baier also notes that in the business of our salvation, God is always causa libera, never causa necessaria. A necessary cause is one which must operate under certain given conditions. E.g., when an ignited fuse reaches the powder magazine of a loaded canon, there must be an explosion and a discharge. Nor thus does the grace of God operate in prompting God to save sinners. God’s grace is not anything distinct and separate from God Himself. God’s grace is simply the gracious God. And God‘s grace prompting God practically means: the gracious God determining Himself to a certain action.
Grace is sometimes predicated of men, who are said to speak with much grace, or exhibit a certain grace. In that case, grace is a quality of men which has been bestowed upon them. Human graces are gifts of divine grace. (Gnadenwirkungen, dona gratiae infusa.) In the matter before us grace is always to be understood as something in God, in the will of God. It is “benignus Dei favor erga peccatores.” Luther: “Gnade heisst eigentlich Gottes Huld oder Gunst, die er zu uns traegt bei sich selbst.” Human graces are always imperfect, the grace of God never. “Seine Gnade teilet und stuecket sich nicht, wie die Gaben tun.”
Right here, at the definition of saving grace, a great gulf opens up between the Church of Rome and the Protestant churches. Rome always connects this meaning with saving grace, viz., that it is a quality imparted to, and inherent in, men by which they love God. Protestantism always has understood grace to be the divine love, which comes to the sinner from without. Melanchthon, accordingly had gained no point against his opponent Eck at Augsburg, when he made the latter acknowledge that we are justified by faith. Melanchthon reported the event to Luther thus: “Ich habe ihn gezwungen zu bekennen, dass die Gerechtigkeit dem Glauben recht zugeeignet werde. Doch hat er gleichwohl begehret wir sollten also schreiben, dass der Mensch durch die Gnade und den Glauben gerecht werde. Das habe ich nicht widerfochten, aber der Narr verstehet das Wort ‘Gnade’ nicht.” Luther replied: “Scribis Eccium ater esse coactum fatiri [sic], nos fide iustificari; utinam coegistis eum non mentiri.” Eck evidently meant to say: “Not faith alone, but grace, namely the love of God in man’s heart, plus his faith justify.” Saving grace must, therefore, not be understood of gratia habitualis, grace indwelling in man; it does not denote caritatem qua nos Deum diligimus, sed qua Deus nos diligit. Only when thus understood, do we say of grace that it is the foundation of our justification and salvation.
The fundamental error of the Roman Church and of the sects is this, viz., instead of that grace which God in His heart bears to us, they make the effects of the divine grace in man the basis of man’s justification. The Papists urge that man must
become contrite, fast, confess, do works of penitence, in order to have the grace of God in him. The sects are all teaching with Rome on this point. Over and against this we must forever insist, that saving grace is in God alone and ever remains in God. There is never any saving grace in man. The revelation of this saving grace must be looked for in the Word of God, especially in the promises of the Gospel, but not in the heart of man. If man desires to perceive the grace of God, he must study the word of God. Grace enters the heart of man only in so far as man believes the word of God’s grace. Accordingly, if we are troubled about our possessing the grace of God, or if we are to advise a troubled soul who is in quest of saving grace, there is no other way than to direct the party to the Word of God, and bid him take notice of what he is reading there. That Word states, e.g., “Believe in Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.” Hence it is wrong to bid men to struggle and wrestle in spiritual agony and prayer, until the assurance of the divine grace enters into their consciousness, they have obtained what is called “internal forgiveness.” Even Christians become spiritually afflicted through their own fault, they are peering inquiringly into the condition of their own heart and are anxiously waiting to experience a great, joyous sensation within them, on which they wish to base the conviction that they are saved and in a state of grace. They are usually disappointed, for although a Christian is usually vouchsafed moments of spiritual elevation (Gnadenstunden), even these are not granted him that he should base his faith on them. They are bestowed for God’s own purposes in His divine pedagogy of our sinful truant hearts. The only way to be spared a sad disappointment, is not to enquire anxiously into our subjective state of heart, but to look directly, with both eyes, into the Gospel. Such texts as: “God so loved the world,” etc., “if God be for us,” etc., are true, reliable manifestations of saving grace, which are always, everywhere and to everybody accessible and sufficient for every occasion. A person who refuses to believe the saving grace of God upon the testimony of the Gospel; a person who makes his faith in grace depend upon his sensations of grace, really does not wish to be saved by grace, but by his own perception of grace. Hence he would be saved by himself rather than without himself. Accordingly, we must be ever scrupulously careful when speaking of saving grace, not to speak so as to cause our hearers to imagine we are speaking of the gifts of grace in them.
Huelsemann praises our Lutheran confessions, especially the Formula of Concord, and the Apology, because “they have liberated the term ‘grace’ and ‘gratis’ from an equivocation,” because they have shown that these terms can never be understood “de habitu infuso.” The world is still full of such equivocations. The New Catholic Cyclopedia blandly uses the terms “grace” and “faith” and even “faith alone,” when speaking of man’s justification and salvation to deceive their own people and unwary Protestants. However, they always understand grace in the heart, gratia infusa, and they will admit that we are saved by faith and grace, because the grace which they mean enters the heart by faith. When we say, salvamur sola fide, we mean that there is nothing in us, no grace in us, that saves us, but merely the grace which we behold and believe in the Gospel. The grace which we have thus characterized is designated in Scripture not only by “charis,” but also by “eleos,” mercy, Ephesians 2:4; “agapä,” love, 1st John 4:9; “chrästotäs,” Titus 3:4, and similar terms expressive of the divine favor to sinners. Yea this grace is taught in
hundreds of Scripture texts like 1st Timothy 2:4; Matthew 11:28, where the exact word is not used at all, but a plain fact of saving grace is indicated.
2. In Ephesians 1:7 Paul predicates of God not only “charis,” but “ploutos täs charitos”; and in Ephesians 2:4 he calls God “plousios en elleei.” Saving grace has not a little but very much to do for everyone to whom it comes; for this reason, therefore, there needs to be an abundance of grace. But grace is also designed for “all men,” 1st Timothy 2:4; Matthew 11:28, for “every creature,” Colossians 1:23, for every individual sinner, Ezekiel 18:32. And this grace starts in eternity in God’s “own purpose and grace which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began”; it enters the present eon by the call of grace, and terminates in the eternity of the future, 2nd Timothy 1:9. Hence Scripture teaches “universal grace,” gratia universalis. Baier names as the subiectum gratiae, “homines omnes aes singuli, etiam peccato corrupti.” He points that there is an eminent fitness in this universality of saving grace; for all men were in the same condition of perfection before the fall; they are in the same condition of misery after the fall. Accordingly, it is proper that grace should assume no differences among them, but should come to all impartially.
Calvinism cannot teach this grace. What grace it does teach deals with men as classes, not as individuals. Calvinistic grace is always partial grace of a partial God, and the mystery in the Calvinistic doctrine of election is that very partiality in God.
Grace deals with men as sinners. Had there been no sin, there would have been no need of saving grace. But while this is true, it would be improper to say that God has been gracious propter peccatum, as if sin had merited grace. True, one of the ancient fathers exclaimed in rapture when contemplating the grace of God: “O beata culpa, quae talem meruit habere Redemptorem,” but this is simply loose speech or poetic license. The proper and practically the most effectual way to express the relation of grace to sin is this: Despite men’s sin, God is gracious to all. Or to speak in the words of St. Paul: “God hath concluded all under sin, that He might have mercy upon all,” Romans 11:32. When a person has been brought to the knowledge of his sin, he will exclaim first: O my sin! O my sin! Then the minister must show that this is an essential feature of grace, that it works non obstante peccato, sin notwithstanding. No matter what kind or what multitudes of sin a person may have oppressing his conscience, he must be shown that God’s grace comes to him in spite of his sin.
The Scripture proof for the universality of divine grace may be presented in a sort of climax under three heads; by means of –
1) those passages which declare that God would have all men to be saved, and that we should pray for all men: 1st Timothy 2:4; Titus 2:11; Romans 11:32. It is a futile attempt of Calvinism to read the word “all” in these passages in the sense of “all kinds of.”
2) those passages which declare the world the object of God’s grace, John 3:16; 1st John 2:2. The last passage in particular exposes the miserable subterfuge of the Calvinists who take “kosmos” in the sense of the sum-total of the elect who are “the world par excellence”; for in 1st John 2:2 “kosmos” designates the world insofar as it is a sinful world and in need of an advocate.
3) those passages which declare that God would have no one to be lost, yea, that His grace actually extends to those
who are actually lost: 2nd Peter 3:9; Ezekiel 33:11; 18:23, 32; Matthew 23:37. Here again the hopelessness of Calvinism is revealed: to escape the force of these texts Calvinists do not blush to teach that we must distinguish in God a secret and a revealed will. According to His revealed will, God would have no one to perish; according to His secret will, He will save only the elect. We ask: if that is a secret will of God, what is secret about it after Calvinists have told us what it is?
Gerhard in attacking the absolute decree of the Calvinists’ predestination declares that he will place over and against it “beneficam Dei voluntatem,” “the gracious will of God,” and this gracious will of God he proposes to establish by three arguments: 1) Scripturae verbi; 2) lacrymae Christi; 3. Dei ipsius iruamento.
It is a pet belief of modern writers that Luther was a particularist, at least in the early part of his career. It is true that in the book which he himself has pronounced his greatest, in his treatise de libero arbitrio, which he directed against Erasmus, he speaks of two wills in God: the revealed will and the secret, but does not operate at all with the latter; he merely acknowledges the fact, which we noted in our study of §35, that God has reserved things for Himself, which He has not revealed, and Luther, moreover, warns men not to occupy their minds with an attempt to find out this will of God. He directs all to read God‘s thoughts concerning them in His revealed will. Since Luther is being misrepresented, it will not be amiss if we note a few of his sayings. In regard to grace, he says: “Gleichwie die liebe Sonne dadurch nicht verdunkelt oder verfinstert wird, dass sie vielen leuchten muss, ja die ganze Welt ihres Lichtes, Scheines und Glanzes geneusst; sie behaelt ihn Licht gleichwohl ganz, es gehet ihr nichts ab, sie ist ein unmaessig Licht, koennte wohl noch zehen Welten erleuchten…. Also ist Christus unser Herr (zu dem wir Zuflucht haben muessen und von ihm alles bitten) ein unendlicher Born und Hauptquelle aller Gnade, Wahrheit, Gereghtigkeit, Weisheit, Lebens, die ohne Mass, Ende und Grund ist; also dass wenn auch die ganze Welt so viel Gnade und Wahrheit daraus schoepfte, dass eitel Engel daraus wuerden, noch ginge ihr nicht ein Troepflein ab; die Quelle laeuft immerdar ueber voller Gnade. Wer nun, keinen ausgeschlossen, seiner Gnade geniessen will, der komme und hole sie bei ihm” (Walch, VII, 1597). As regards the belief of Luther that also the redemption of Christ and the operations of the Holy Spirit are universal, it is needless to offer proof; for Luther’s writings everywhere express this belief.
The opposition to the doctrine of universal grace is very old. About the year 415 there arose the sect of the Predestinatiani; and about 849 the Godoschalci, who denied that God desires the salvation of all. But it was chiefly through Calvinism that a systematic and persistent attack was made – with a different force and from a different point by different Calvinists. All Calvinists may be divided, first, into Supralapsarians, and Sub- or Infralapsarians. Supralapsarian Calvinists teach that God has decreed, before He has viewed man as fallen, to create the greater part of mankind unto perdition and to hurl this part into destruction, in order thereby to declare His absolute power and righteousness. Calvin, Beza, Piscator, Gomarus, Maccovius are Supralapsarians. The Sublapsarians or Infralapsarians teach that God, after viewing man as fallen, decreed to pass the greater part of mankind by with His grace and to leave them to perdition. The majority of modern Calvinists who follow the decrees of the Synod of Dort are Infralapsarians. But the Infralapsarians divide themselves
further into categorical and hypothetical Calvinists. The former believe that the greater part of fallen man was absolutely passed by in the decree of election; the latter believe that the passing by of the greater part was conditioned upon their unbelief. Or, in other words, the hypothetical Calvinists teach a sort of universality of grace sub hypothesi fidei, or – si credant homines. Practically this becomes categorical Calvinism when drawn out to the last conclusion. Cameron, Amyrald, Bergius, Crocius are hypothetical Calvinists. In America this class of Calvinists is sometimes called Post redemptionists, because their theory starts with the situation as it has been created after Christ has finished His work. Now that all have been redeemed, it is, according to their belief, decreed that there is grace for all, provided they believe. God, however, has decreed, who shall believe, hence His universal offer of grace is nugatory.
The Presbyterian Church of America says in its Confession of Faith, Section III, number 7: “The rest of mankind,” (namely, all besides the elect) “God was pleased, according to the unsearchable counsel of his own will, whereby he extendeth or withholdeth mercy as he pleaseth, for the glory of his sovereign power over his creatures, to pass by, and to ordain them to dishonor and wrath for their sin, and the praise of his glorious justice.”
The grace of God, this benignus Dei favor, which God in His own merciful heart bears towards sinners, must now be studied in its activity. For it is an active grace. Baier says: “Haec gratia Dei non est otiosa quaedam complecentia Dei, ad salutem omnium terminata, si haec contingent.” It is not a mere idle complacency on the part of God which has nothing to do with the salvation of men except that He regards it as a contingency with which He would be pleased. On the contrary, the universal grace of God is a serious and efficacious grace, gratia seria et efficax. This means that God Himself does everything for men and in men that is necessary for their obtaining salvation. Baier says of this grace: Una secum importat inclinationem Dei ad conferendum… ea, quae faciunt ad procurandam salutem omnium. The grace of God implies an inclination on the part of God to supply what is necessary for procuring the salvation of all.
We have now reached a point where it is of the highest importance to use correct terms in speaking of divine grace. Baier tells a piece of Lutheran church history, when he relates: “Although some of our theologians occasionally call that will of God, by which He desires the salvation of all, a conditioned, not an absolute will; still they do not call it thus in the sense that God desires the end under a certain condition, which He Himself does not wish to meet in most men; that God desires merely the end (finis), not the means to the end. But they call it thus insofar as God, when He desires to save men, does not wish them to be saved without satisfaction having been rendered or any condition fulfilled whatsoever, but He desires them to be guided unto salvation under the condition of certain means being used which He has appointed to that end. Baier’s language at this point is not quite cautious enough, and he is liable to fall into the same pit against which he warns us. In speaking of the gracious will of God, we should say first that it is not an absolute will (voluntas non absoluta), because it embraces the satisfaction which Christ has had to render for all men and also the order of salvation. Absolute, from absolvere, would denote a will that is completely torn loose from all considerations whatsoever that has no relation to anything. The gracious will of God, by which He desires to save all, is
based on Christ. Christ has earned this gracious inclination in God for us. Hence this gracious will cannot be conceived at all without reference to Christ; hence it cannot be called absolute. Moreover, by His gracious will God desires that men should be saved in this wise, not that they should go to sleep and sleep till doom’s day, but that they should believe the Gospel. God’s gracious will cannot be conceived of at all without connection with evangelical preaching and the evangelical ordinances. Hence it is not absolute.
In the second place, it is just as little admissible to say that the gracious will of God is conditioned, voluntas conditionata. This would mean that God graciously wills, indeed, the final result, man’s salvation, but is unconcerned about the means and way to obtain that result. Practically, the grace of God would, in that case, have to do, not so much with the actual salvation of men, but with the possibility of their salvation. This is the favorite view of modern theology: it holds that divine grace establishes the possibility but not the actuality of salvation. Grace effects not faith, but creates an opportunity or ability for faith (nicht Glauben, sondern Glaubenkoennen). It secures not perseverance of faith, but only the capacity for persevering in faith. But a text like Philippians 2:13: “God worketh in you, both to will and to do” upsets this theory. Whoever has actually been made a believer by the grace of God, received from that grace not merely a capacity for believing, but had the very act of faith kindled in him. For that grace worked in him not the ability or propensity to will, but the act of willing. In like manner Paul says, Philippians 1:29: “It has been given you… that ye might believe,” i.e., not the chance to believe, but actual faith was given you. This notion of modern theology that God supplies the opportunity and ability for believing, but the act of believing He expects man to perform, is rationalistic. It sounds plausible to our reason, and it flatters our natural vanity not a little. But if we are saved by grace alone and grace is this thing which modern theology makes of it, then it is hard to understand why not all men are saved, provided this grace is efficacious and serious. So after all, this modern theory does not stand.
But does not Scripture itself condition salvation upon faith? Does it not say: “Believe, and you will be saved,” or: “If you believe, you will be saved?” It is necessary to settle in our minds what the force of certain imperative and certain conditional clauses is, which Scripture uses when declaring the order of salvation. The attempt has been made by Melanchthon, the Roman dogmaticians (Bellarmine), and in modern times by Luthardt, to argue from the fact that Scripture speaks of faith in conditional clauses that faith itself is a condition. E.g. Romans 10: “With the heart man believeth unto righteousness”; German “So man von Herzen gelaubet, so wird man gerecht.”
Now it is a fact that conditional clauses are used in all languages for a twofold purpose: either they lay down a real condition which must be fulfilled, if a certain event is to follow, or they describe the mode and manner in which a certain event takes place. E.g., in the sentence: if any man would not labor, neither shall he eat, we have a true condition with its consequence expressed. But in the statement: If you [would] eat, your hunger will be appeased, there is simply a law of nature, working after a particular order expressed.
This distinction must be applied to such texts of Scripture as seem to speak of faith as a condition. Faith has to do altogether with the Gospel. The Gospel differs from the Law,
amongst other points in this, that while the Law imposes conditions, the Gospel imposes none. While the Law issues demands and makes promises to those complying with its demands, the Gospel makes no demands but makes offers, which are entirely free and unconditioned. Hence it is proper to distinguish in Scripture propositiones legales and propositiones evangelicae.
Those evangelical propositions which speak of faith cannot be meant in the sense of a true condition, because they are usually placed in contrast with salvation by works. Just because man must not attempt to be saved by his works or merits, therefore, he is told to believe. Accordingly, this statement: if you [would] believe, you will be saved, cannot mean: By rendering faith, or upon your exertion in believing, or for the price of your faith, you will be saved, but it can mean only by way of faith, in the order of believing you will be saved: credens salvaberis. Just as little as the stilling of hunger is the reward of the act of eating, just as little is salvation the earned recompense of the act of believing.
Faith is wrought in man’s heart by the Word of divine grace, “akoä pisteoos.” The conditioned clauses afore-mentioned are a part of this word of grace, and a preacher can produce faith in his hearers by preaching these conditional clauses as by preaching any other Gospel statement. The imperative: “Believe!” is an imperativus evangelicus, and effects the very thing which it seems to demand. Hence these conditional clauses and imperatives must not be declared useless, since they demand what no one can render, nor are they to be understood as ironical statements, by which the righteous God mocks at man’s self-inflicted misery. Any person who preaches the conditional clauses and imperatives which speak of faith in that sense in which Scripture employs them, preaches Gospel and works faith in men by preaching them. But if a person declares faith to be the human effort which must be executed to merit a corresponding effort on the part of God, he destroys entirely the doctrine of the Gospel and of grace, by preaching these conditional clauses. It is possible, too, to apply the reductio ad absurdum to those who claim that the conditional clauses now under consideration must be understood as true conditions, signifying what share man has in his own salvation. For 1) it is wrong to argue from a demand to an ability. The statement: If you pay me $5,000 you may get my farm, contains no statement whatsoever as to what I am able to do. A debito ad posse non valet consequentia. 2. The people who discover in these conditional clauses an indication of human ability, usually put a damper on their own claims, by saying: Of course, we do not mean that man can do all that is necessary to save himself, but he can do something, and these conditional clauses and imperatives show it. They show no such thing; if we must take them as statements of a real genuine condition, we must let them stand at full value. We must argue: Man can do all, not some of what is here demanded. If men shrink from doing this, they prove that their view is untenable, and that they feel themselves that their claims cannot be upheld to the last conclusion.
Accordingly, while it is wrong to say grace is absolute, and wrong again to say, grace is conditioned, it is proper to say, grace is ordered, gratia ordinata. Grace works according to a well-thought out method. Quenstedt expresses this matter correctly thus: “Non quidem sub conditione ‘si credant’, sed nec absolute, verum sub ‘taxei’ certa mediorum; non ergo absoluta est haec Dei voluntas, sed ordinata, minime autem (stricte
loquendo) conditionata.” And of those Lutheran theologians, who have spoken of the gracious will of God as a conditioned will, Quenstedt says: “Vox conditionis ‘pachyloos’ accipitur, hoc sensu, quod non absolute, sed ordinata Deus velit salutem omnium.”
The Missouri Synod has occasionally been charged with teaching an absolute grace in the business of the sinner’s salvation. The reason for this charge is, because the Missourians have always refused to believe and teach that divine grace, in order to really save a sinner, must be supplemented, or supported, or aided by the proper conduct in man. We have declined the doctrine that there is any reason in man why he should be saved. If our opponents choose to call us absolutists on that account, we shall have to suffer that, as men must suffer other slanders in this life, but it is a strange use, in our view, of the term “absolute.”
In §35 on the divine will page 31 [A. L. Graebner, Outlines], and particularly, in subdivisions 6 and 7, page 33, we noted a distinction between the antecedent and the consequent will. This distinction rests on an old usage that has prevailed in the Christian Church. Chrysostom speaks of a voluntas prima and secunda; Damascenus of a “theläma proägoumenon” and a “theläma hepomenon”; Anselm calls the former voluntas misericordiae, the latter voluntas iustitiae. The sense of this distinction is: voluntas antecedens, or prima, or “proagoumenä,” or misericordiae signifies that what God wills in the first place; voluntas consequens, or secunda, or “hepomenä,” or iustitiae, what God wills in a certain contingency, according as men believe, or do not believe. E.g., according to an antecedent will, God wills that all men should be saved; according to the consequent will, God wills that some shall not be saved, namely in the event that they persist in refusing the grace of God and die impenitent. Gerhard, in introducing this distinction between the two wills, says that the basis for it is furnished by the wonderful equilibrium (balance) between the justice and the mercy of God. He also defends this distinction against a misrepresentation by the Calvinist Maccovius, who charged the Lutherans with teaching that God had from eternity taken pity on all, but had afterwards changed His will. Gerhard replies: “No one of us has stated that a change has taken place in God’s will, but we say that the consequent will is subordinate to the antecedent. This distinction can be illustrated in various ways, e.g., by the example of a father, who is equally well disposed toward all his children and desires that all should become heirs of his estate, but excludes the incorrigibly degenerate children from the heritage; or by the example of a physician who offers all, who have been stricken with the pestilence, his precious medicine, and desires the recovery of all, but leaves those to perish by their own fault who spurn the offered medicine. Moreover, Hollaz who also adopts the distinction between the antecedent and the consequent will, says that the distinction is not made on the ground of a difference in time, nor so as to imply that there are in God really two different wills, but only from the view-point of our reason, which distinguishes various volitions in God in accordance with the varying views which God takes of an object. Scharf says of this whole distinction: “Dicitur rationis distinctio, quia non in re ipsa, sed per rationem hoc est, per operationem mentis ponitur et concipitur.”
When the distinction between the antecedent and the consequent will in God is explained as these theologians have explained it, and when all false views that might be connected
with it are declined, the distinction may be admitted. Still it is safe to follow those teachers of our church who restrict the voluntas consequens to those who perish because of their unbelief. The two illustrations which Gerhard introduce fit only to unbelievers. A false view is created when the voluntas consequens is applied to those who are saved, namely a synergistic view. When God admits those who die in faith to heaven, He does this by no other will than that which He had concerning them from the moment that He considered their salvation in eternity. There is in this case no need at all to introduce a new will, unless a person means to make the original will of God for man’s salvation a conditioned will, viz., on the condition that they believe, or perform holy works and abide in faith unto the end, and represents the voluntas consequens as the divine acknowledgment that they have fulfilled these conditions. If we would apply the distinction of Anselm and call the original will of divine grace voluntas misericordiae, and that will which finally admits believers to heaven voluntas iustitiae, a strange situation is created: the sinner is admitted to the merits of Christ in conversion by the mercy of God, but he is ultimately admitted to heaven in accordance with the just verdict of God, i.e., upon the merit of duties performed. For this reason we should not speak of a voluntas consequens in reference to those who finally are transferred from grace not to justice, but to glory.
The Calvinists have raised the following objection: If the universal grace is a serious intention on the part of God, all men would have to be saved; for no one can resist the will of God. But Scripture and our own experience prove that not all men are saved; hence the universal grace of God cannot be a serious grace. This objection ought not to be met with the rejoinder of modern synergists, who say that the universal grace of God is not almighty; for Scripture testifies plainly that it is in Ephesians 1:19, 20 and 2nd Corinthians 4:6. The proper reply to the objection is that God’s gracious will is a voluntas ordinata; it is executed by certain means, and God works through means, mediately. For this reason, though His gracious will is almighty, lacks nothing as regards efficacy, still because – by God’s own choice – it works through means, it can be resisted. If God approaches a certain object by His bare majesty, without any means, He effects His purpose irresistibly. In this manner He will on Judgement Day exert His majestic will upon unbelievers. Still there is a great mystery connected with this matter: when the gracious will of God is preached there is a manifestation of the greatness of God’s power, and yet man’s perverse will can resist this power. We can relieve the intellectual tension which this observation produces somewhat by pointing to a parallel in man’s secular affairs: man can destroy life, but cannot quicken life that has been destroyed.
Our text book reminds us that the gratia applicatrix, of which we are now speaking is “the same universal grace which moved Him to procure and work the redemption of mankind.” Baier explains the connection between the grace of God and the work of Christ thus: “Cum in Deo praeter bonitatem etiam iustitia vindicativa sit agnoscenda, certum est, bonitatem illam sic tendere in hominum salutem, ut nec iustitiae aliquid decedat, idioque ipsa bonitas Dei Deum movet ad procurandum medium, quo iustitiae divinae pro peccatoribus satisfiat.”
Besides grace or goodness, there is in God another essential attribute: His vindictive justice (Strafgerechtigkeit). The grace of God is the sole cause of the sinner’s salvation. And it saves the sinner without prejudice to that justice by which
God must punish the sinner. How is this possible? Do not grace and justice contradict each other? When God deals with the sinner in accordance with His grace, He does not deal with him in accordance with His justice. By His grace He forgives, by His justice He punishes sin. Now Baier says correctly: “Non possunt sibi adversari, quae simul in Deo sunt, in quo nulla locum habet inordinatio.” And hence he argues: “Itaque et bonitas aut gratia illa Dei non aliter tendit ad salutem hominum peccatorum, quam in quantum, salva iustitia divina, fieri potest.” Only in so far does grace aim at the salvation of sinners as this can be done without peril to the justice of God. Grace and justice coexist in God, and exert their force in the very work of the sinner’s salvation. God permits His justice to exert itself upon a substitute for sinners, Christ, and Christ having satisfied the justice of God, the grace of God can now have full and free sway.
This view, that God is gracious to sinners only after satisfaction has been rendered to His justice, has been combated since olden times. The reasons adduced against this view are rationalistic. Thomas v. Aquinas proposed this thesis: God being the supreme Judge, He can, by His sovereign power forgive sins, without satisfaction having been previously rendered to His justice. If God is almighty, He can forgive sin without a previous satisfaction. A most determined attack, however, was made upon the necessity of a previous and necessary satisfaction to divine justice by the rationalists of the sixteenth century, the Socinians. One of their theologians, Ostorod, constructed the following dilemma against the orthodox teachers of the Church: “Aut non potuit Deus aliter iustificare, et sic labefactatur potentia Dei, aut no voluit, et sic misericordi cadit.” Gerhard met this dilemma 1) by the construction of a counter-dilemma. He asked the Socinians to kindly explain from their own standpoint why God does not save all men and says: “Si noluit, tollitur gloria misericordiae, si vero voluit et non potuit, tollitur gloria omnipotentiae.” He told them that if they could answer this question, they mighty apply that to their own question. 2) Gerhard argued that we may safely concede, both that God did not want to, and that He could not remit guilt without a previous satisfaction. He did not want to do it because it was not proper for Him to do so, and He had declared His intention regarding the sinner’s guilt in a different manner; and He could not because it was in itself impossible to do so; for it was repugnant to divine justice and truth to leave sins go unpunished.
The trail of the Socinians has been taken up by the rationalists of the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. These people urge: 1. The absolute sovereignty and omnipotence of God. In view of these, they claim that it is impossible to imagine that God should be restricted in forgiving sin, and should be obliged to defer forgiving sin until satisfaction could be rendered by the vicarious work of Christ. 2. They urge the free grace and love of God. They claim that it is a contradiction to free grace to teach that grace had to be purchased by the satisfaction of Christ. We meet these arguments 1. in a general way, by declaring at the start, that this whole discussion, as to what the omnipotence and the grace of God is able to accomplish or not, is out of place, because it rests on a false presupposition, viz., that men can perfectly know a priori the attributes of God. The opposite, however, is true: the omnipotence and the grace of God are a priori just as incomprehensible to us as is God Himself. 2. We declare this whole disputation useless, because the matter in question has already been decided by Scripture.
Romans 3:25 teaches that the grace of God saves us after satisfaction has been rendered to the vindictive justice of God. According to the view of Scripture grace is free in so far as it does not depend upon any human merit and is [an] offer “doorean,” in the form of a present; however, this free grace is in God Himself mediated by the redemption of Christ, or His merit “dia täs apolytrooseoos täs en Christoo Iäsou”). Free grace in the sense of Scripture is grace that has not been purchased by human merit.
Luther has expressed himself on this matter in quite a number of places. To cite a few, he says: “Dieser Spruch ist ewiglich wahr, Psalm 5:6: ‘Du bist nicht ein Gott, dem gottloses Wesen gefaellig ist’. Denn ob er gleich die Heiligen annimmt, die doch noch Suende an ihnen haben, so nimmt er sie doch nicht ohne eine grosse Bezahlung an: Christus hat muessen Opfer werden, um welches will Gott uns annimmt und schonet, so lange wir im Glauben bleiben und wenn wir im Glauben bleiben” (X, 2001). Again: “Gott koennte wohl durch seine Allmaechtigkeit das menschlich Geschlecht selig machen ohne Christo, ohne die Taufe, ohne das Wort des Evangelii; er haette inwendig die Herzen der Menschen erleuchten und die Suende vergeben koennen ohne das Predigtamt und ohne die Kirchendiener; er hat es aber nicht tun wollen” (II, 1139). And the strongest passage perhaps is this: “Wer wollt Gott wehren, wo er uns haette mit der Tat wollen erloesen, und nichts davon Predigen lassen, noch Mensch werden? Gleich wie er Himmel und Erde geschaffen hat, und alles macht noch immerdar ohne aeusserlich Predigen, und wird nicht Mensch darum, sollte drum das Evangelium nichts sein? Nun ers aber dir will durch die Menschheit, durchs Wort, durchs Brot, im Abendmahl geben, wer bist du hoffaertiger, undankbarer Teufel, der du fragen darfst, warum ers nicht sonst sonder ohne die Weise tue? Willst du ihm Maass und Weise setzen und waehlen? Du solltest fuer Freuden springen, dass ers tut, durch welche Weise er will, allein dass du es erlangest” (XX, 1101, 1103). Over and against this vie [sic] we may not [sic] what Hofmann says: “There remains this difference between the doctrine of the Church and my own, that I do not hold that the Son is the object of the Father’s wrath, not even as a substitute…. The anger of God did not smite Him instead of us, so that the punishment had been executed (upon Him), and need not be executed any more (on us).”
In what manner the satisfaction required by the justice of God was rendered, it is needless here to repeat, as we studied that in connection with the priestly office of Christ. However, the same grace which procured salvation for all men by the satisfaction rendered by Christ now tends “with an efficacious intention” (Baier), to do, and actually does, all that is necessary on the part of God that all may appropriate the satisfaction rendered for them by another. Also in the personal application or appropriation of the merits of Christ, the grace of God is the sole operating cause.
This does not mean that God’s grace operates in an irresistible manner, irresistibiliter, gratia irresistibili. The application of the merit of Christ to the individual sinner is effected by faith. Faith is created in man by the word of grace. Both Scripture and the common experience of men show that over and against this applying grace which comes to him through the Gospel, the sinner possesses one fatal power: he can resist its operation, and thwart the ends of divine mercy. In Matthew 23:37 the Lord charges the Jews with an exercise of this power, when He says: “How often would I have gathered
your children… but ye would not.” From a passage like this we prove that the term “resistible grace,” gratia resistibilis, is a Scriptural term, i.e., that the fact expressed by this term is established from Scripture, though we do not find the very term in Scripture.
Caution is necessary in the use of this term. Not infrequently has the term “resistible grace” been used in such a manner as to make the origin of faith in us depend, in part, on man. Our reason is prone to infer from the fact that grace may be resisted, this other fact, that the reason why one person obtains faith, another not, is because the former did not resist grace, while the latter did. Hence the former did something toward appropriating grace, which the latter omitted doing. This is contrary to Scripture, which teaches both, viz., gratia resistibilis and sola gratia; in other words, grace can always be resisted, and grace alone saves without any aid from man. Both facts must be accepted as equally true. If the fact that grace is resistible is adduced for explaining why one man is converted rather than another, the intention is unquestionably this, to show that God does not do all that is necessary for man’s salvation, but that man possesses this natural ability to cooperate with divine grace when he is approached by it. This fact determines in individual instances, whether a person is converted. Modern synergism has adopted this view in America, and has declared that the conversion and salvation of man cannot depend on the grace of God alone, but must also depend on the conduct of man for this reason, because converting and saving grace is resistible. And the Missouri Synod has been charged with teaching an irresistible grace, because it will not admit the afore-mentioned inference. In regard to this point read the article by Pastor Dreyer, “Der Schmidtianismus in seinem eignen Licht,” in Lehre und Wehre, 1885, Seiten 169-180; also the article by Dr. Pieper, “‘Widerstehliche’ und ‘unwiderstehliche’ Gnade,” in Lehre und Wehre, 1887, Seiten 117-125; 160-167.
Whenever the question is raised, why of two persons equally perverted and in equal guilt one is converted and the other not, we must decline both the Calvinistic explanation of this difference, and the synergistic one. Synergists explain the difference by saying that there was not equal effort to lay hold of grace put forth by both; hence the causa discriminis is in man. Calvinists explain the difference by saying there was not an equal, or equally serious grace offered to both, hence the causa discriminis is in God. To us this question will always appear unanswerable, because if we answer it in one or the other ways afore-mentioned, we destroy either the gratia universalis or the sola gratia, which Scripture teaches.
Solutions of this mystery, why one is converted rather than another, have been attempted by men who meant to retain their hold both on the teaching of universal grace and on the teaching of grace alone. But these attempts have resulted either in a specious explanation, or they have ultimately run into either Calvinism or Synergism. Such an attempt is made by the distinction between resistentia naturalis and resistentia malitiosa. By natural resistance is understood the common indifference and hostility of all men to the office of divine grace, which is owing to their natural depravity; by willful or malicious resistance a peculiarly violent and persistent opposition to grace. But while we may admit that there are various kinds of resistance among men over and against the grace of God, not only two kinds, but as many kinds as there are men on earth, we cannot find any explanation in this difference why one man
is converted rather than another, so long as we are compelled to teach that each and every kind of resistance must be removed and overcome by God, and no kind of resistance can be removed and overcome by man himself. Besides it is impossible for any man to determine when resistance is merely natural and when it is malicious. in a purely spiritual and almost entirely invisible matter, who can furnish us with a reliable standard of measurement, a sort of spiritual barometer that could apply to the subject of divine grace? Is not the whole distinction, therefore, an arbitrary one? Besides, experience teaches that conversion has taken place in cases when the most violent resistance was put forth, as e.g., in the case of Saul of Tarsus, while no conversion was effected in cases that seemed outwardly much more promising. Hence we should decline to make use of the distinction between resistentia naturalis et malitiosa.
We are forced to the limits of revelation to restrict all that we say concerning the salvation or perdition of individual men, and the reasons for either of the two statements: the reason why some are converted and saved is solely the grace of God; the reason why some are lost is solely their own unbelief. Beyond this we can offer no explanation, because Scripture offers none.
We should not be intimidated, either, by the argument of history, so often brought forth by Calvinists. They say the record of nations and countries, etc. show that God has not granted His Word to all men alike; hence it was not His intention to save all alike. In rejoinder, we can point to the fact that Christians have been found in places where no one can show how the Gospel was brought there, while, on the other hand, just those people who received the Gospel rejected it. Children of believing parents turn out hopeless reprobates, while children who have grown up under the most unfavorable conditions imaginable, in a spiritual respect, turn out exemplary believers. All these things we refer to the inscrutable ways of God, and to those judgments of which St. Paul says, “they are past finding out.”
Nor should we permit the argument to be offered in this connection that Scripture teaches a rejection of unbelieving, reprobate men by God. It is true, Scripture does teach that men are given over to a judgment of hardening, when they are of reprobate mind as a punishment for their sin, but this reprobation was not something which God had decreed in eternity to inflict on them, but something which they have brought upon themselves here in time.
Accordingly, Chemnitz, Selnecker and Kirchner wrote correctly in their Apology of the Book of Concord (Dresden, 1584, 206): “The Book of Concord does not deny that God does not work alike in all men; for at all times there have been many whom He has not called by the office of the ministry; but our opponents shall never persuade us to draw from this fact the inference which they draw from it, viz., that God is a real cause of the reprobation of such people, and that He has in His bare counsel decreed to reject and reprobate them in eternity, even regardless of their sin. Denn genug ist es, wenn wir an diese Tiefe der Geheimniss Gottes kommen, mit dem Apostle, Romans 11 sprechen, ‘Seine Gerichte sind unerforschlich’, und 1st Corinthians 15: ‘Wir danken Gott, der uns den Sieg gegeben hat durch unsern Herrn Jesum Christum’. Was darueber ist, wird uns unser Seligmacher Christus im ewigen Leben selbst offenbaren.”

§132. The Instrumental Cause.

We noted that applying grace is a gratia ordinata also for this reason that it works through appointed means. These means are the Gospel and the holy Sacraments. God works all soteriological acts in man “mediante verbo” (Baier).
In Bibliology we studied the Word of God, which is the inspired Scripture of the canonical books of the Bible, as the principium cognoscendi in theology. But in certain paragraphs, like that of the efficacy of Scripture (§16), there was a strong indication of the saving power of Scripture; likewise in the paragraph on the purposes of Scripture (§19). It is in this latter respect, viz., as the means and instrument of conferring upon the individual sinner the salvation wrought for all by Christ, that we must study the Word of grace, the Gospel, in particular, and in connection therewith, those gracious ordinances to which God has attached some Gospel promise. The Gospel, then, is now before us as the medium salutis, “organum accendendae fidei salvificae” (Baier), “salutaria spiritualis nostri morbi alexipharmacon,” the wholesome antidote for our spiritual disease (Quenstedt). Hence the Word of God is to be considered in the following paragraphs not as the principium “gnooseoos,” but as the “medium ‘praxeoos’” (Hollaz). Calov: “Principium operandi vel efficiendi seu ‘poiätikon’ vel effectivum,” not so much as the norm governing and determining our theological inquiries, but as the instrument for putting into effect the gracious counsels and purposes of God concerning the sinner. Hollaz defines all the means of our salvation, and offers some illuminating distinctions regarding them, thus: “The means of salvation are means that have been divinely ordained, and through which God, from His grace, offers to all men, that have fallen into sin the salvation acquired by our Mediator Christ, bestows true faith on them and preserves the same, even as He also leads to the Kingdom of Glory all who embrace the merit of Christ with an abiding faith.” Hollaz distinguishes between the means of salvation strictly so-called and the means of salvation in a broader sense. The means of salvation strictly so-called are again divided into means by which God confers, and means by which man receives salvation (media ex parte Dei “dotika” seu salutem exhibentia, medium ex parte nostri “läptikon” seu oblatam salutem apprehendens). As media “dotika” ex parte Dei he names “verbum et sacramenta,” as medium “läptikon,” “fides merito Christi innixa.” Means of salvation in a broader sense are such events as temporal death, the resurrection of the dead, the last judgment and the consummation of this present world. These means Hollaz proposes to call “eisagogika” or “exsecutiva et in regnum gloriae introducentia.” He calls them executive means, because through them the divine sentence of glorification and damnation is enacted and executed; and isagogical or introductory means, because by their agency those persons who have persevered in faith unto the end are transferred to the Kingdom of Glory.
It is necessary, first, to examine the Scripture proof for the teaching of an instrumental cause in soteriology, or of the actual existence and operation of the so-called means of grace.
1. The passages under this head are intended to show that the application of the merits of Christ is, indeed, made through the intermediary agency of communicating organs. In Galatians 3:2 Paul is still addressing the “irrational Galatians,” and endeavors to wrest from them one particular self-confession before others, which he might also demand from
them for their own refutation: he wants them to inform him how it happened that they received the Holy Spirit. “Pneuma” is “the personal divine principle of the whole Christian nature and life,” “the Holy Spirit viewed generally according to His very various modes of operation by which He makes Himself known in different individuals.” Two answers were possible, “duo directa opposita,” Bengel. The one would have been wrong: “ex ergoon nomou,” “by the fulfillment of works which the Law prescribes.” This could not have been the means through which the Spirit came to them, because, though they had long been zealous in a legalistic sort of religion, their lives had been void of that vitalizing element which characterizes the Christian. Hence it can only have been “ex akoäs pisteoos,” by the report or message urging upon them subjective faith, which was preached to them; “the readers had become partakers of the Holy Spirit through the news concerning faith.” The “akoä pisteoos” was the channel, or organ of communication by which the Spirit entered their hearts. Galatians 3:18 introduces an ancient illustration of the fact set forth in verse 2. The reception of the Spirit through the preaching of faith was not an unusual occurrence at all; thus it had been in the days of Abraham. He had “the inheritance,” “kläronomia” = “niachalah,” i.e., the possession of Messianic salvation. How did he obtain it? “Ek nomou”? so that the Law was the institution and his following its commandments the way in which salvation came to him? If that were so, God would have had no need to come to Abraham in quite another way, “di’ epangelias,” by the way of promise, “so that in his case the possession of the Messianic salvation is the fulfillment (the way of grace) of a promise, and not the possible result (by was of reward) of rendering prescribed services, and the like, which fall under the head of ‘nomos’.” This fact is still more strongly brought out by “kecharistai” – God gave it to him, viz., the inheritance. “Charidzesthai” means to bestow a favor, to extend grace, “charis.” This was done in Abraham’s case through the instrumentality of a promise – Galatians 3:22. Yea, what happened to Abraham and again to the Galatians are not isolated occurrences, but the ordinary way in which God conveys His benignus favor to men. By the just sentence of the Law as published in the Scriptures God has completely shut up mankind in its totality, “ta panta sunekleisen,” like prisoners in custody. His purpose was: “hina hä epangelia dothä ek pisteoos,” that the promised thing, viz., the inheritance might be bestowed as a gift, and this gift might come to the individual from his faith in Christ Jesus. God’s gracious way of working with sinners, then, is “di’ epangelias.”
In John 14:27 we have, so to speak with Luther, “the last words as of one who is about to go away and says ‘good-night,’ or gives his blessing.” But “eiränä aphiemi hymin” is stronger than the Oriental “shalom lecha,” or the Latin “pacem dare,” which are conventional phrases expressing a wish for prosperity. “That which men were wont to wish at departure, Jesus is conscious of leaving behind, yea, of giving to His disciples,” for He adds: “eiränän tän emän didoomi hymin.” He gives “his peace,” “the entire prosperity of His redemptive work.” But how does He give it to them? Is not all that He says a promise of future blessings? Is not the “didoomi” rather a promitto? Is not the Paraclete in after days to bring to the troubled disciples this peace of which Christ is speaking? No; He gives it by these very words. The gift of peace, a far better gift than the treasure, pleasure, honor which the world gives, is
wrapped up in these words and is conveyed to His troubled disciples by means of these words.
In Acts 2:38 the Apostle speaks of repentance (“metanoäsate”), i.e., of a change of ethical disposition, and of “baptidzein epi too onomati Iäsou christou,” “baptizing on the ground of the name of Jesus Messiah, as the contents of your faith and confession, that on which the becoming baptized rests.” This baptism has for its object, to be obtained by it (“eis”) the remission of that guilt which had been contracted by the party in that state which preceded his repentance. Forgiveness of sin, and “doorea tou pneumatos” are to come to men through the agency of baptism. Hence Paul can speak of the Gospel of Christ as “dynakis tou theou eis sootärian,” Romans 1:16, i.e., salvation is the object at which the Gospel aims, and which it effects by its inherent power. And when Paul assures the Corinthians (2nd Corinthians 5:19) that God hath committed unto him and the other apostles the word of reconciliation, “themenos en hämin ton logon täs katallagäs,” he declares the reconciling work of Christ to be a deposit in the heart of the Gospel preached for further communication, “sicut interpreti committitur quid loqui debeat,” Bengel. Gospel preaching, then, is an agency through which God, who reconciled the whole world to Himself in Christ, and who now wishes to reconcile the redeemed individuals to Himself, chooses to operate toward such reconciliation. The means by which the grace of God operates is, in reality, only one, viz., the Gospel. But since God put the promises of the Gospel before us in various ways and forms (Scripture, preaching, sacraments) we speak of means of grace in the plural.
2. But what is it that is actually wrought by means of the “epangelia,” the promise of Christ and the ordinances and institutions, to which He has attached His word of grace? We noted in our study of the preceding paragraph that the prompting cause in God, His own grace, aims to produce in men not only a capacity, ability and proneness for certain results to be obtained, but rather those very results. It is to be shown now that the instrumental cause likewise produces in men “not only the capacity and capability of accepting what is offered, but also such acceptance itself.” The entire distinction between capability and actuality is foreign to the plain and simple teachings of Scripture. From the “akoä,” i.e., the message, there proceeds such a direct and finished result as “pistis,” Romans 10:17, and according to verse 14 this result cannot spring from any other source. Likewise Christ makes “pisteuein,” actual believing, not “the ability to believe,” the object of His prayer, John 17:20. The word, which a preacher of the Gospel proclaims, aims not in a roundabout, but in a most direct way, at the “sootäria,” the actual salvation of the hearers, Acts 11:14; James 1:21. And through the same instrumentality perfection in every Christian grace, hence not the germ, but the ripe fruit, not the incipient stage, but the very goal of every spiritual condition is obtained, Colossians 1:28. But if we do not wish to distinguish between effects which the power of the Gospel, Romans 1:16, and the “able” Word, James 1:21, can produce, we can point out that that they are said a)to offer salvation: first, by exhibiting it (“testify,” John 5:39; “made known,” Ephesians 1:7-9), and then by extending it (“give,” John 14:27; Galatians 3:18); b) to appropriate salvation (“receive,” Galatians 3:2; Acts 2:38; “have,” Ephesians 1:7).
3. The texts under this head specifically name the written Scriptures, 2nd Timothy 3:15-17; John 5:39, and the spoken Word of God, Colossians 1:28; 1st Corinthians 1:21;
15:1, 2; Ephesians 1:7, 9, as the instrument for producing every possible spiritual effect of divine grace in men. Gerhard remarks: “Since there is no real difference between the written and the unwritten word of God, it is held that the honorable encomiums placed upon the Word for its efficacy and fruit, belong by right also to the Holy Scripture. As the Word, by being written, did not cease being divine, neither did it cease being an efficacious organ of conversion and salvation…. Hence it is possible to obtain faith and spiritual joy, and consequently, everlasting salvation also from the written Word of God, when it is put to use by reading and meditation.” Those, therefore, who would render “akoä” in Romans 10, as our English Bible has rendered it, viz., “hearing,” should heed the same author’s remark: “The remark in Romans 10:17: ‘Faith cometh by hearing’ must not be taken in an exclusive sense, so that the hearing of the Word that is preached is placed in contrast to the reading of the Word that is written, but in an inclusive sense, so that it is represented as efficacious for faith and salvation, not only through the Word when heard but also when written, since the Word remains the same, whether it is preached and heard or written and read. For this reason John significantly says: ‘These are written that ye might believe’ (John 20:31).”
4. The texts in this section refer to the holy sacraments, in and by which the same promise of grace is conveyed to some visible and tangible element to which the promised blessing is attached, and by some palpable action. The proof-texts for the instrumentality of the sacraments in the operations of applying grace refer only to the sacrament of baptism, because in the very beginning of the work of applying grace, baptism is the only sacrament which God employs as an organ in His work.
The Word and the sacraments are means of divine grace, i.e., whatever is produced by their instrumentality is produced by God. God works by means of the Gospel and Gospel ordinances. We witness something wonderful when men hear or read the Gospel: while they are terrified and flee from God when they hear the thunderings of His Law and the awful threats of His offended righteousness, their fears are calmed and they conceive a cordial confidence in this same God, when they hear His Gospel. Why this marvelous effect? It is the operation of the almighty God, in whose hands are the hearts of men. He causes them to believe His gracious offers “according to the working of his almighty power,” Ephesians 1.
God has no other ways, methods, agencies, organs or instruments through which He effects His gracious purposes in men. “Deus non nisi per verbum et sacramenta homines ad aeternam salutem vocat, ad se trahit, convertit, regenerat et sanctificat,” J. Olearius. The Formula of Concord states: “The declaration (John 6:44) that no one can come to Christ except the Father draw him is right and true. But the Father will not do this without means, and has ordained for this purpose his Word and sacraments as ordinary means and instruments; and it is the will neither of the Father nor of the Son that a man should not hear or should despise the preaching of his Word, and without the Word and sacraments should expect the drawing of the Father. For the Father draws indeed by the power of his Holy Ghost, but, nevertheless, according to his usual order [the order decreed and instituted by himself], by the hearing of his holy, divine Word, as with a net, whereby the elect are delivered from the jaws of the devil. Every poor sinner should therefore repair thereto [to holy preaching], hear it attentively, and should not doubt the drawing of the Father.
For the Holy Ghost will be with his Word in his power, and thereby work; and this is the drawing of the Father” (Solid Declaration, Chapter XI, paragraph 76f., page 662f.).
Sectarian teaching makes also prayer and fasting, and work of penance in general means of grace. This is faulty, because these things are found only as things that are fruits of the Spirit in hearts already inhabited by the divine grace; and they were obtained only by the hearing of the Word.
It is a wise and merciful arrangement that God has restricted His gracious operations to certain means, and that He does not approach us by immediate contact and wants us to understand His gracious intentions concerning us, not from what we experience in our heart, but from the intelligence He conveys to us in His Word. The operations of the Holy Ghost would be in danger of being grievously misjudged by men if men were left to determine their presence, character, process and force from the state of their hearts. This would lead to enthusiasm (Schwaermerei). “Concerning the presence, operations and gifts of the Holy Ghost,” says the Formula of Concord, “we should not and cannot always judge from sense, i.e. as to how and when they are experienced in the heart; but because they are often covered and occur in great weakness, we should be certain, from and according to the promise, that preaching and hearing the Word of God is[truly] an office and work of the Holy Ghost, whereby he is certainly efficacious and works in our hearts” (Solid Declaration, Chapter II, paragraph 56, page 563). If we heed this warning, we will be kept from the error of those who confound the natural emotions of the heart with the operations of divine grace, and grieve over the absence of divine grace from their hearts, when they notice no natural sensations of grace in themselves.
Here again we may note the master-hand of Luther. He says: “God will not tolerate that we should put our confidence in something, or with our hearts cling to something, that is not Christ revealed in His Word, no matter how holy and full of the Spirit it may seem to be. Faith has no other foundation on which it may rest…. Wir muessen Christum suchen in dem, das des Vaters ist, das ist, dass wir uns schlecht und blos an das Wort des Evangelii halten, welches uns Christum recht zeig und zu erkennen gibt. Und lerne nur in dieser und allen geistlichen Anfechtungen, so du willst andere oder dich selbst recht troesten, also mit Christo sagen: Was ist es, dass du so hin und wieder haeufest, dich selbst so zermalmest mit aengstigen und betruebten Gedanken, als wolle Gott dein nicht mehr Gnade haben und als sei kein Christus zu finden, und willst nicht ehe zufrieden sein, du findest ihn denn bei dir selbst und fuehlest dich heilig und ohne Suende; da wird nichts aus, es ist eitel verlorene, Muehe und Arbeit. Weisst du nicht, dass Christus nicht sein will, noch sich finden lassen, denn in dem, das des Vaters ist nicht in dem, das du oder alle Menschen sind und haben? Es ist nicht der Fehl an Christo und seiner Gnade; er ist und bleibt wohl unverloren und laesst sich allezeit finden. Aber es fehlet an dir, dass du ihn nicht recht suchest, da er zu suchen ist, weil du deinem Fuehlen nach richtest und meinest, ihn zu ergreifen mit deinen Gedanken. Hierher musst du kommen, dass nicht dein noch einiges Menschen, sondern Gottes Geschaeffe und Regiment, naemlich da sein Wort ist, da wirst du ihn treffen, hoeren und sehen, dass weder Zorn noch Ungnade da ist, wie du fuerchtest und zagest sondern eitel Gnade und herzliche Liebe gegen dir…. Aber schwer wird es, ehe das Herz dazu kommt und solches ergreift; es muss zuvor anlaufen und erfahren, dass alles verloren und vergeblich
Christum gesucht heisst und zuletzt doch kein Rat ist, denn dass du dich ausser dir selbst und allem menschlichem Trost allein in das Wort ergebest” (Dr. Martin Luther’s Sammtliche Schriften, supervisor George Stoeckhardt, Band XI [Saint Louis: Concordia, 18–], Seiten 453-455).

§133. The Gospel.

As the chief instrumental cause in any act by which God applies grace to the sinner, the Gospel was mentioned in the preceding paragraph. This cause we will now study in detail.
Gospel is the present form of the Anglo-Saxon god – spell, God tale, a tale from, or about God; or a tale so good that it could only come from God. But this derivation, says the Standard Dictionary, is but the folk etymology, the real etymology being god = good, and spell – tale. This makes Gospel the exact equivalent of the Greek “euangelion.”
1. In the superscription of the four Gospels in our Bible, the term Gospel is used in the sense of “account” or “record.” So also in Mark 1:1. In this sense it embraces all that our Lord said, also His exposition of the Law of Moses, as in the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 5-7. It also includes the record of all His acts, and has almost the meaning of “biography.” It is not in this sense, but in a strict sense – proprie loquendo – that we are now to consider the term Gospel. The Formula of Concord calls attention to the general and the special meaning of the term in Solid Declaration, Chapter V, paragraphs 3-6, Jacobs, page 589f.; Epitome, Chapter V, paragraph 5, page 506f.; Solid Declaration, chapter V, paragraphs 20, 21, page 593f.; Epitome, Chapter V, paragraphs 6, 7, page 507.
The Gospel in the strict sense is defined by Baier thus: “Est doctrina de gratia Dei et gratuita remissione peccatorum propter Christum mediatorem eiusque meritum fide apprehensum.” It is any word of God, in which the sinner is assured of present righteousness and peace of conscience and of future rest and glory, because of the reconciliation effected by Christ. In this sense the Gospel is the exact contrary of the Law. The Gospel in this sense is meant in the call of the Baptist, Mark 1:15, and in the bold avowal of Paul, Romans 1:16. To preach the Gospel in this sense one must array himself against Jewish legalism on the one hand, and against Greek culture, which is only another form of legalism, on the other.
The Gospel in the strict sense cannot be confined to the New Testament. It is found also in the Old Testament. True, as regards the multitude and clearness of Gospel statements, there is a difference in favor of the N. T. But it is simply misconceiving the one doctrine of salvation, which is taught throughout the Bible, to say that there is no Gospel in the O. T. As surely as the scope of the entire O. T. is to announce Christ, who was to come, John 5:45, 46, as surely the Gospel is found in the O. T. Whoever does not find it there, has failed to grasp the meaning and the purpose of the O. T. No man was saved, even in the O. T. times, in any other way than that which the Gospel proposes. Even in paradise salvation for the fallen sinner was attached to the promise of Christ.
Baier constructs the following O. T. Gospel chain: Genesis 3:15; 12:3; 15:6; 22:18; 49:10; Deuteronomy 18:15, 18; Psalm 2; 8; 22; 45; 48; 68; 110; Isaiah 7:14; 53:4ff.; 61:1ff.; Jeremiah 23:5; 33:15; Daniel 9:24; Hosea 13:14; Micah 5:2; Haggai 2:8; Zechariah 9:9; 13;1; Malachi 1:11; 3:1; 4:2. He also notes that the ceremonial rites and types of the worship of God
in the Old Covenant, insofar as they foreshadowed the work of Christ, must be counted as Gospel material of the O. T.
Quenstedt reminds us that the term O. T. is used in a three-fold sense: 1) systematice vel dogmatice, to denote the canonical writing of the O. T.; 2) chronologice, to denote the time prior to the manifestation of Christ in the flesh. This time divides into two eras, utterly distinct from one another: from Adam till Moses the Church of God lived by the promise of the Woman’s Seed; through the giving of the Law Israel entered into a legal covenant with God. The covenant entered into at Mt. Sinai was, indeed, purely a legal covenant, Jeremiah 31:31, 32; 2nd Corinthians 3:6ff.; Galatians 3:15ff.; 4:21ff. Its provisions saved not a single Israelite. Men in those days were saved by the Gospel, which was preached along side of the Law; hence 3) foederalster, to denote this very Covenant, with its constitutions, under which the nation of the Jews was formed into a theocracy. The term N. T. can be understood in these same senses. Accordingly, it is a pagan teaching to declare that in O. T. times men had obtained justification by the Law. This would destroy the declaration: “Neither is there salvation in any other,” Acts 4, and the statement that justification is “chooris ergoon nomou, Romans 3. Hence the view of the Pelagians must be rejected, which holds that prior to Moses men were justified and saved “sola lege naturae,” after Moses “sola lege Mosis,” in the N. T. “lege evangelica”; also the Socinian view, which claims that justification and salvation by Christ “in Vetus Testamentum locum non habuisse”; also the Arminian view which declares it to be certain that the promise of eternal life through faith in Christ is found nowhere in the O. T.; also the view of the Anabaptists, who assert that the patriarchs of the O. T. knew nothing of Christ and that the salvation in the O. T. was an altogether different affair from what it is in the New.
2. The Gospel in the strict sense is a “doctrine” = doctrina, i.e., an orderly statement, a course of instruction, or as Baier paraphrases it, “complexus promissiorum, quae hominibus peccatoribus gratae, laetae, ac salutares sunt, quarum summa habetur, John 3:16.”
And it is a divine doctrine. Its Author is God. With a certain solemnity Paul says to the Galatians 1:11: “Gnooridzoo de hymin” = “But (now to enter more particularly on the subject of my letter) I make known unto you.” What he wishes to tell them, was a fact known to them before by their own experience. But they must not forget it. The fact is this: “The gospel, which was preached of me” to you and to others, “is not ‘kata anthroopon’.” Meyer: “It is not of such quality as it would be if it were the work of men; it is not of the same nature as human wisdom, human efficiency and the like.” Bengel: “Non est humani census evangelium meum,” my Gospel is not according to the estimate of men. The apostle here asserts the superhuman or divine quality of the Gospel. But the quality is conditioned by its origin. He proceeds in verse 12 to declare why his Gospel is not “kata anthroopon.” This verse should be rendered thus: “Neither I received it,” namely as little as the other apostles. The apostle now rejects two possible ways in which the Gospel could have come to him: 1) “ou para anthroopou parelabon,” I received it not by communication from a man, who might have brought me the information; “oute edidachthän,” nor was I taught it; I was not given a special course of instruction. And now he states the true way in which the Gospel came to him: “alla de apokalypseoos Iäsou christou,” but by revelation of Jesus Christ. “Jesus Christ,” like
“antroopou” before, must be the subjective genitive – by Jesus Christ revealing it to me. “Jesus Christ,” then, is in contrast with “anthroopou” before, and “apokalypsis” is contrasted with “parelabon” and “edidachthän.” “How the ‘apokalypsis’ took place must be left undecided. It may have taken place with or without vision, in different stages, partly even before his baptism in the three days mentioned Acts 9:6, 9, partly at and immediately after it, but not through the instruction of Ananias,” Meyer. In like manner Paul declares to the Corinthians (1st Corinthians 2:12, 13) that the things which he knew (“eidomen”) and spoke (“laloumen”) were freely, or graciously, given him (“charisthenta”), and that, “en didaktois pneumatos, in teachings of the Holy Ghost, not “en didktois anthroopinäs sophias,” in teachings emanating from human wisdom. And the Corinthians who had heard him preach had thereby received a “charismata,” gift, by which they were to be made rich (“eploutisthäte” [1st Corinthians 1:5]). This “charisma” was the “martyrion tou christou,” i.e., the Gospel, which is virtually the testimony which Christ renders of Himself.
So, too, Zacharias views the Gospel, which he describes by its ultimate purpose as “gnoosis sooterias,” and says that it is a gift (“dounai”), Luke 1:77. The disciples were sent forth upon their Gospel errands with the assurance that in hearing them, men would hear Christ, Luke 10:16. The congregation at Jerusalem appeals to the Lord, that over and against the fierce opposition of the Jewish synagogue He might grant unto His servants to speak His word, “logon sou,” Acts 4:29. At Iconium Paul and Barnabas were “parräsiadzomenoi epi too kyrioo,” speaking boldly upon the Lord, i.e., resting their assurance upon the Lord who was with them in their utterance, and what they spoke thus is called “logos täs charitos,” i.e., the Gospel, whose very essence and entire contents is grace, Acts 14:3. Hence the Gospel is called “rhäma kyriou,” 1st Thessalonians 1. God holds to the Gospel the relation of Author, not only in so far as He has constructed the materials of the Gospel, given in its blessed contents, but also in so far as He connects His gracious power with the actual preaching of the Gospel.
3. 4. This Gospel comes, firstly, in the form of a general announcement, an all-embracing declaration, “eis ton kosmon hapanta,” into all the world, “pasä tä ktisei,” to every creature, Mark 16:15. “Ktisis” is used here as in Colossians 1:23, “kat’ exochän,” viz., for men, and the sense is: to the whole creation of mankind. It is the same as “eis panta ta ethnä,” Luke 24:47, “pasin tois ethnesin,” Matthew 24:14, “en pasin tois ethnesin,” Romans 1:5. And that not a single human being, be he Jew or Gentile, or whatever else, is excepted, is brought out by the statement in romans 10:18: “eis pasan tän gän,” and “eis ta perata täs oikoumenäs.” The Gospel is a universal manifest of the gracious God to the inhabited globe. There is no language, race, age, sex, rank, station with which the Gospel has not to transact the business of God. It must at least announce these facts: 1) that “aphesin hamartioon,” Luke 24:47, is obtainable, and that the “basileia” is to be erected among men, Matthew 24:14; and 2) that “hypahoä pisteoos, Romans 1:5, or “pistis,” Romans 10:17, 18, is the way to obtain both. This announcement may ultimately prove to have been made “eis martyrion,” for an accusing testimony against those who would not be saved, Matthew 24:14. But when the announcement was made, it truly exhibited to those, to whom it was made, the blessings which it named to them: “gnoosis sootärias en aphesei hamartioon,” Luke 1:76, 77.
5. Yea, more. There is in this universal grace not only a vis exhibitiva. Saving grace is not proclaimed in the tantalizing manner which a cruel man would adopt, who comes to a people famished with hunger and shows them an abundance of food which is suspended in the air and which they can never reach, but there is in this Gospel a vis collativa, a power to confer on the hearers the very things which it announces to them. Paul and Barnabas had been preaching “logon to theou” at Antioch. As the preceding part of Acts 13 shows, it was the Gospel of the crucified and risen Christ, which they had proclaimed with marked effect. By means of this preaching “dzooä aioonios” had been brought near to the Antiochians. Everlasting life was put within reach of the hearers, and they pushed it from them (“apotheisthe”) like the ruthless person spurns the gift of a kind friend. At Colossae pagan darkness had reigned before the Gospel was preached there. Ages and generations had passed and the people had been in ignorance of its mysterious message. The mystery was lighted up, “ephaneroothä,” when preaching of the Gospel was commenced. Men obtained light from the words of the preacher, Colossians 1:26. Meyer: “The ‘phaneroosis’ has taken place differently, according to the different subjects; partly by ‘apokalypsis’, Ephesians 3:5; 1st Corinthians 2:10, as in the case of Paul himself, Galatians 1:12, 15; Ephesians 3:3; partly by preaching, Titus 1:3; Romans 16:26; partly by both. The historical realization (de Wette, compare 2nd Timothy 1:10) was the antecedent of the “phaneroosis,” but is not here this latter itself, which is, on the contrary, indicated by “tois hagiois autou” as a special act of clearly manifesting communication. In 2nd Thessalonians 2:10 Paul speaks of “hoi apollumenoi,” those that perish, i.e., those who are ultimately rejected. These men at our time have the best opportunity “eis to soothänai.” Salvation was made so completely accessible to them, that the only explanation of their final ruin is: “tän agapän täs alätheias ouk edexanto,” they received not the love of the truth. Had they received it, their faith would have been the reverse of what it is. On the other hand, the apostle commends the Thessalonians (1st Thessalonians 2:13) for having received the Word of God, for this word worked in them (“energeitai en hymin”). “’Hos’ is not to be referred to ‘theou’, but ‘logon theou’, for 1) in what immediately precedes the subject is not ‘Theos’, but ‘logos Theou’; 2) Paul always uses the active ‘energein’ of God, and the middle ‘energeisthai’ of things,” Meyer. This text should be read in connection with verse 12, where the apostle speaks of the call of grace, “tou kalountos hymas eis tän heautou basileian kai doxan,” “so that the meaning is: Because God calls you to such a glorious goal, so we thank God continually that you have understood this call of God which has come to you, and that you have obeyed it,” Meyer. In the chapters teaching of the various stages of salvation, such as the call, illumination, regeneration, conversion justification, sanctification, preservation, we shall always have the Gospel placed before us in the language of our dogmaticians, as the causa instrumentalis for those acts. That is, any Word of God declaring those acts to a person who hears it, creates a real opportunity and occasion for those acts.
6. Yea, still more. There is in the Gospel, not only a vis collativa, but also a vis operativa seu effectiva. “By the power inherent in such grace (which it offers, the Gospel) efficaciously operates in their hearts (of those who hear it) toward the acceptance of His gracious gifts,” says our textbook. This carries the instrumentality of the Gospel a step further than the
vis collativa. By means of it the forgiveness of sins and the righteousness, which Christ has earned by His obedience unto death, is not only placed at the door of the sinner’s heart, but the sinner is by the same Gospel empowered and impelled to take it and appropriate it. Paul in Romans 1:16 calls the Gospel which he has proclaimed “dynamis theou.” “Power of God (gen. of subj.) is the Gospel, in so far as God works by means of the message of salvation. By awakening repentance, faith, comfort, love, peace, joy, courage in life and death, hope, etc. the Gospel manifests itself as power, as a mighty potency, and that of God, whose revelation and work the Gospel is…. The expression asserts more than that the Gospel is ‘a powerful means in the hand of God’ ([Leopold Immanuel] Rueckert), and is based on the fact that this is the living self-manifestation and affluence of God, as ‘rhäma Theou’, Ephesians 6:17… ‘eis sootärian’ [Romans 1:16] states the working of that power of God: unto salvation, consequently with saving power. And what salvation is here meant was understood by the reader; for ‘sooteria’ and ‘soodzesthai’ were the standing expressions for the eternal salvation in the Messianic Kingdom,” Meyer. The same thought is expressed when the apostle says 1st Thessalonians 1:5, that the Gospel came to the Thessalonians “en dynamei.” The words “panti too pisteuonti” are taken thus by Meyer: “Faith is the condition on the part of man, without which the Gospel cannot be to him effectually that power; for in the unbeliever the causa apprehendens of its efficacy is wanting. Melanchthon aptly says: ‘Non enim ita intelligatur haes efficacia, ut si de calefactione loqueretur; ignis est efficax in stramine, etiam si stramen nihil agit’.” This is an insufficient statement and misleading. While it certainly is true that where there is no faith, there the receptive organ is wanting, and while it is likewise true, that the power of the Gospel is not exerted ex opere operato, or irresistibly, still it is liable to be misunderstood to speak of faith “as the condition on the part of man,” i.e., that which man must render in order that the Gospel may be efficacious to him. Just this faith which the Gospel demands, it produces. The “receiving of the Word,” which is nothing else than believing, was, in 1st Thessalonians 2:13, traced to the energy of the Word of God. The obedience of the Gentiles, viz., their faith, was wrought by Paul’s word, Romans 15:18. And Paul calls himself and Apollos “ministers by whom the Corinthians believed,” “diaknoi di’ hoon episteusate,” 1st Corinthians 3:5. Likewise, when the Hellenists at Antioch in Syria heard the men from Cyprus and Cyrene “euangelidzomenoi to kyrion Iäsoun” in their city, a great number of them believed: “än cheir kyriou met’ autoon.”
We shall see later (§142) that the rise of faith in the heart and regeneration are coincident events. It is virtually the same thing whether I say: A person becomes a believer, or: A person is regenerated. Accordingly Scripture traces regeneration to the same instrumental cause as the origin of faith, viz., the Gospel. James 1:18 we read: “apekyäsen hämas logoo alätheias,” He (God) begat us by the word of truth. “Logos alätheias” “is the Gospel, which is so called because ‘alätheia’ in its entire reality is inherent in it (Harless),” Meyer. The verb “boulätheis” at the head of this statement connects with the verb “apekyäsen.” It was by willing that God generated. But since He used the Gospel as the instrument for carrying His volition into effect, that act of willing connects also with the instrument. The influence of the divine will is exerted through the medium of the Gospel. At the end of this text the Apostle calls the regenerate “ktismata,” creatures of God. The
“apekyein,” then, was a creative act, and this again adds to the virtue of the Gospel. In God’s hand it is a creative instrument. Accordingly, Paul, the preacher of the Gospel, can say to his Corinthians hearers: “dia tou euangeliou egoo hymas egennäsa,” 1st Corinthians 4:15. And perhaps varying the simile to that of a seed sown in the earth, which then buds and sprouts, Peter says: “anagegennämenoi… dia logou dzoontos theou,” 1st Peter 1:23. With this instrumental cause, then, goes out as the Personal Agent of God, the Holy Spirit; and the Gospel ministers this Spirit to its hearers, that is, bestows it upon them, Galatians 3:5. From the moment that a person “hears and knows the grace of God in truth,” Colossians 1:5, 6, the word which brings it to him “estin karpophoroumenon kai auxanomenon [Tischendorf].” This word is “ho logos täs alätheias tou euangeliou.” Wonderful energies are latent in it, which are revealed throughout the entire life of a believer.
The vis operativa seu effectiva of the Gospel is declared in strong and striking terms in Hebrews 4:12. The “logos tou theou” in this text is generally “the Word of God” as proclaimed and preserved in Scripture. Some have referred it to the Gospel; others to the threatenings of God, still others to the threatenings and promises of God taken together. The context must decide which view is correct. “In its application to the case here specially coming under notice, the Word of God was the call to receptivity of heart, repeatedly made by God through the psalmist. God also threatened to exclude those who would obstinately disobey this call from His ‘katapausis’, rest; this fact was contained in the call as an inference which the hearer could readily make. But strictly speaking the ‘logos tou Theou’ was only this call to rest. Now of this ‘logos’ the apostle says that it is “dzoon,” living, on account of its inner vital power” and ‘energäs’, effective, on account of its asserting itself, manifesting itself vigorously in the outer world. The latter is the consequence of the former.” The apostle now views this power chiefly as it effects the contemners of the Gospel, or the call to rest. In ascending gradation he describes the penetrating sharpness of this power. “‘Kai tomooteros hyper pasan machairan distomon’, and more trenchant than every, or any, two-edged sword, literally a sword with a two-fold mouth, i.e., with an edge on both sides, so that it can devour on either side. Keener than such a sword is the ‘logos tou theou’. The following words introduce the proof of this statement: “kai diiknoumenos archi merismou psychäs kai pneumatos harmoon te kai myeloon,” and piercing to the separating of soul and spirit, joints as well as marrow. ‘Merismos’ has been understood as the secret spot where soul and spirit separate, but that would be an unusual signification.” Meyer: “denotes simply the action of separating, and the separating subject is the Word of God. When that approaches any person it has power to dissolve his inner most being. All four words ‘psychäs’, ‘pneumatos’, ‘harmoon’ and ‘myeloon’ depend upon ‘merismou’. Hence what the apostle intends to say is not that there is a separation 1) of the soul from the body, 2) of the joints or the joinings from the marrow. Nor does he say that the soul and spirit on the one hand, are separated from the joints and marrow on the other hand, but what he declares is that there is a ‘merismos’ of each of these four substances in itself. The two last substances, however, are not coordinate to the two first, but subordinate. For ‘psychä’ and ‘pneuma’ are here not in opposition to ‘sooma’, which latter alone can be pierced by a real sword. ‘Psychä’ represents the lower sensuous life, ‘pneuma’ the higher life of the spirit. When the
Word of God comes, the appetites and sensibilities, and the reasonings and the aspirations of a person feel something keen and sharp passing through them. The joints and marrow of which the apostle speaks are, of course, not those of the body. He is not thinking of a physical, but of a spiritual sword and has no thought of any physical attack upon the organism. The joints and marrow here are the invisible ligaments and vital chords of the ‘psychä’ and ‘pneuma’. We have here a figurative expression denoting the innermost, most hidden depth of the rational life of man. The Word of God runs into the depths of human consciousness. It thus is ‘kritikos enthymäseoon kai ennoioon kardias’, qualified to take cognizance of, or to judge the dispositions and thoughts of the heart.” Most vividly the vis operativa of the Word is here declared.
But is this Word here really the Gospel? Are we not more correct in understanding all this of the onslaughts of God’s accusing Word upon our consciences, and of those terrible inward searchings and dissectings which the soul must undergo in the agony of remorse? I answer by pointing once more to the context. The apostle here speaks beyond a doubt of that Word by which sinners are called unto their souls’ rest. That surely is the Gospel. Now let us remember that Christ has said that the Word which He has spoken, hence, not only the Law, but chiefly the Gospel, shall judge men on the last Day. The same word of grace which men have rejected is turned into an accusation to them. Not that the Word itself has changed, but the hostile attitude, which men will assume toward it, gives this gracious Word a terrible meaning to its contemners. However, it exerts this power on the sinner from the first moment it approaches. The sinner sees that he needs it, needs it only. Men go all to pieces, as it were, under the preaching of the Gospel. They do not always, perhaps never to the full extent, reveal what dividings are going on within their bosom. But the “merismos” is in progress among them.
7. While the preceding section placed before us the via operativa of the Gospel as an undeniable fact of biblical teaching, and illustrated the same by such events in man’s life as the springing up of faith or the new birth in him, the present section wishes to show that the very act of accepting the gracious gifts of God is a product of the Gospel by its vis operativa. This spiritual action of “lambanein to pneuma,” receiving the Spirit, is “ex akoäs pisteoos,” i.e., it springs from the message of faith, the Gospel, Galatians 3:2. “Pisteuein,” believing is “dia tou logou autoon,” by the word of the apostles, John 17:20. “Anoixai ophthalmous,” opening of the eyes, “epistrepsai apo skotous eis phos,” turning from darkness to light, “labein aphesin hamartioon,” receiving forgiveness of sins – these acts Paul was sent to produce among the Gentiles by preaching the Gospel, Acts 26:17, 18. This power of the Gospel was explained to Cornelius, when he was told that Peter “laläsai rhämata” would say words to him “en hois soothäsä,” by means of which he would be saved, Acts 11:14. Of the Gospel, which he had preached at Corinth, Paul says: “di’ hou kai soodzesthe,” by which you are saved, 1st Corinthians 15:2. And he declares this to be the general economy of divine grace: “dia täs moorias tou kärygmatos soosai,” to save by the foolishness of preaching, 1st Corinthians 1:21. The power of the Gospel passes over to any ordinance of God, to which a Gospel promise has been attached, hence, “nyn soodzei baptisma,” baptism now saves, 1st Peter 3:21.
8. 9. But not only the initial acts of the spiritual life, faith, in so far as it accepts divine grace, but every subsequent
act of that life is produced by the Gospel. The fullness of spiritual joy is to come out of such things as John wrote about the Savior, 1st John 1:4. Continuance, “menein,” or perseverance in faith, is to be secured to his hearers, “ean en hymin meinä ho ap’ archäs äkousate,” when that which ye heard in the start abides in you, 1st John 2:24. “Hagiasmos,” sanctification, John 17:17, and such a practical Christianity as the entire self-surrender of a person to God and His service “parastäsai ta soomata thysian,” Romans 12:1, shall be produced by the “logos” which speaks of the “oiktirma tou theou,” the mercies of God.
10. There is a reason why these effects of the vis operativa of the Gospel are not attained in every instance. That reason we shall study in §138 and §141.
The divine Word, which is called the Gospel in the strict sense, is a peculiar species of the general Word of God, and differs from other species, e.g., from the Law. It is of the utmost importance that the theologian recognize fully the peculiar characteristics of the Gospel and the Law. There are points in which these two agree viz., 1) quoad auctorem, as regards their Author; for God has issued both, the Law and the Gospel; 2) quoad subiectum, for both the Law and the Gospel are addressed to all men; 3) quoad finem per se intentum, for both the Law and the Gospel, each in its way, aim at the everlasting happiness of man; 4) quoad durationis terminem, for both the Law and the Gospel will remain in force until the end of the world. The last point must be specially insisted on over and against Antinomians, who claim that through the coming of the Gospel the Law has been entirely abrogated.
But there are also points of difference between the Law and the Gospel, which are of such decisive importance, that no one can be an efficient minister in the Church of Christ unless he has a clear understanding and practical experience of this difference. Law and Gospel differ 1) patefactionis [sic] et cognitionis modo, as regards the manner in which each was revealed, and as regards the manner in which the contents of each are perceived by men. The Law was originally implanted in man and even after the Fall there is still a remnant of knowledge in natural man. But the Gospel is a complete mystery to man; no thought of it has ever been found to exist by nature in any man. It required a special revelation from God to make the Gospel known. Law and Gospel differ 2) ratione obiecti, as regards the materials with which each deals. There is a complete contrariety observable, in that the Law demands actions from man, while the Gospel bids man accept grace and salvation regardless of any deed performed by him. Law and Gospel differ 3) promissorum diversitate, as regards the diversity of the promises which each extends. The promises of the Law are promissiones compensatoriae [compensatae], while those of the Gospel are promissiones gratuitae. The promise of eternal life as issued by the Law is conditioned upon the fulfillment of the Law; the same promise as issued by the Gospel is unconditioned, i.e., the Gospel declares to the sinner, that without any deeds of merit on his part, yea, in spite of his transgressions of the Law, he is to be saved by grace for Christ’s sake through faith. A fourth distinction between Law and Gospel is to be specially noted, because a neglect of this distinction may create serious confusion in the practical work of active ministry. Law and Gospel differ diversitate officii. In the order of salvation there is a definite domain set aside for the operations of the Law and a definite domain for those of the Gospel. If the boundaries of the Law are invaded by the
Gospel, or vice versa, there ensues perplexity and great spiritual disturbance. The office of the Law, briefly, is to lead man to a knowledge of his sins; but the forgiveness of sins cannot be preached from the Law but solely from the Gospel. Hence there is 5) a difference between the Law and the Gospel ratione propositionis. The Law must be applied to secure sinners in order that they may become contrite; the Gospel must be preached to contrite sinners in order that they may become believing.
This matter is of such great moment that it is necessary in order to render you efficient ministers of Christ, to tarry here a while. “Quae alia lux,” exclaims Chemnitz, “discussit densissimas tenebras regni pontificii, nisi haec praecipue, quod demonstratum est verum discrimen legis et evangelii?” Gerhard says: “Haud imerito inter virtutes, quas in fideli ecclesiae ministro requirit apostolus, primum locum attribuit artificio ‘orthotomein’, recte secandi sermonem veritatis, 2nd Timothy 2:15.” And he shows what immense interests are at stake in this matter. 1) The doctrine of justification cannot be correctly taught without this distinction. Our justification is from the Gospel without Law. “Monendi igitur, imo urgendi sunt homines ad opera iuxta legis normam praestanda, sed in theatrum iustificationis nostrae coram Deo non sunt inferenda; ibi enim perpetua est opposita inter operari et credere, inter gratiam et opera, inter legem et evangelium.” 2) The benefits of Christ are obscured, if the doctrine of the Law is not strictly kept out of the domain of the Gospel. 3) A commingling of Law and Gospel creates great and serious perturbationes conscientiae, and the Power of the Keys is misapplied. It is a fatal thing to announce to an impenitent sinner the forgiveness of sins; for he must be threatened with the wrath of God; and it is equally fatal to deny the comfort of absolution to a crushed and contrite soul.
Here again the master theologian is seen in Luther. He says: “Hier bitte ich und ermahne ich alle Liebhaber der Gottseligkeit und sonderlich die, so mit der Zeit andere Leute lehren sollen, dass sie diesen Artikel, der da lehret was des Gesetzes rechtes und eigenes Werk sei, und wie man sein recht brauchen soll, aus St. Pauli Schriften mit allem Fleisch wohl lernen, welcher, wie ich grosse Sorge habe, nach unseren Zeiten wiederum wird verdunkelt und ganz und gar unterdrueckt werden. Denn auch jetzund bereitan, da wir noch im Leben sind und aufs aller fleissigste anzeigen, wozu beide, das Gesetz und Evangelium, ein jedes in Sonderheit diene, ihrer sehr, sehr wenig sind auch unter denen, so sich zum Evangelium bekennen und gar herrlich davon zu ruehmen wissen, die solches Amt des Gesetzes recht und eigentlich verstehen und wissen. Was meint ihr, dass werden wird, wenn wir nun das Haupt gelegt haben? Ich will jetzt der Wiedertaeufer, der neuen Arianer und der Schwaermergeister, so das heilige Sakrament des Leibes und Blutes unsers lieben Herrn Jesu Christi laestern und schaenden, geschweigen, welche allesammt auf einen Haufen so wenig ja verstehen und wissen, was des Gesetzes eigen Werk sei, und wozu es diene, als die Paepstin selbst, ob sie sich mit viel Worten wohl anders vernehmen lassen; denn sie sind vorlaengst von der reinen Lehre des Evangelii zurueckgefallen auf des Gesetzes Lehre; darum lehren sie auch nicht Christum. Das tun sie wohl, dass sie mit grossem Geschrei ruehmen und duerfen wohl auch teuer dazu schwoeren, dass sie nichts anders lehren und mit ihrer Lehre nichts anders suchen, noch meinen, denn Gottes Ehre, der Brueder Heil und dass Gottes Wort moege rein und
lauter ausgebreitet und erhalten werden; aber wenn man bei Licht und im Grunde besehen will, so befindet man, dass sie Gottes Wort faelschen und verkehren in einem irrigen Misverstand, dass es ihnen lauten und deuten muss, was sie traeumen und wollen ihres Gefallens. Darum lehren sie unter Christi Namen ihre eigene Traeume, unter dem Namen des Evangelii eitel Gesetz und Zeremonien, bleiben also immerhin einen Weg wie den andern, wie sie von Anfang, je und je gewesen sind, naemlich Moenche, Werkheilige des Gesetzes und der Zeremonien Lehrer, ohne dass sie ihrem Wesen neue Namen und auch andere und neue Werke erdichten…. Derhalben ist das Gesetz auch ein Licht, das da leuchtet und sichtbar und offenbar macht, nicht Gottes Gnade, auch nicht die Gerechtigkeit dadurch man das Leben erlangt, sondern die Suende, den Tod, Gottes Zorn und Gericht. Denn, gleichwie den Kindern Israel zu Sinne war, da sie unten am Berge Sinai stunden und hoerten das grausame Donnern, sahen das Blitzen, die schwartzen, finstern Wolken, den Berg brennen und rauchen, und was schreckliche Dinge noch mehr geschahen, das ihnen kein lustig noch froehlich Schauspiel war, sondern erschrecklich sie vielmehr, ja, machte, dass sie vor grosser Angst schier gestorben waeren, und lehrte sie, wie sie mit aller ihrer Heiligkeit und Reinigkeit vor Gott nicht bestehen koennten, noch seine Stimme hoeren, die doch aufs aller freundlichste und troestlichste war, naemlich: ‘Ich, der Herr, dein Gott’, usw, also ist auch allen Heuchlern zu Sinne, wenn das Gesetz sein eigen Werk und Amt beginnt auszurichten, das ist, die Suende offenbaren, Zorn anrichten, die Gewissen verklagen, sie schrecken und in Verzweifelung treiben. Das ist des Gesetzes eigen und recht Werk, dabei es bewenden und nicht weiter schreiten soll. Das Evangelium ist viel ein ander Licht, naemlich, das die erschreckten Herzen erleuchtet, lebendig macht, troestet und ihnen aufhilft. Denn es zeigt an, wie Gott den unwuerdigen und verdammten Suender gnaedig sei um Christi willen, wenn sie glaeuben dass sie durch seinen Tod vom Fluch, das ist, von der Suende und ewigem Tod erloest sein, und dass ihnen durch seine Sieg und Ueberwindung geschenkt sei der Segen, das ist, Gnade, Vergebung der Suenden, Gerechtigkeit und ewiges Leben. Wenn wir das Gesetz und Evangelium auf solche Weise unterscheiden, so geben wir einem jeden sein Recht eigen und gebuehrlich Werk und Amt, das ihm zusteht. Aber von solchem Unterschied des Gesetzes und Evangelium findest du nicht einen einzigen Buchstaben in allen Buechern aller Moenche, Canonisten und Sophisten, ja, auch der alten Vaetern dazu. St. Augustinus hat diesen Unterschied zum Teil verstanden und angezeigt. Hieronymus, aber, und andere mehr haben wenig davon gewusst. Summa, es ist in allen Schulen und Kirchen etliche hundert Jahre daher nichts Rechtschaffenes von solchem Unterschied des Gesetzes und des Evangelii gelehrt oder gepredigt worden, dadurch denn die armen, elenden Gewissen in grosser Gefahr und Schaden kommen sind” (Dr. Martin Luther’s Sammtliche Schriften, editor Albert Frederick Hoppe, Band IX [Saint Louis: Concordia, 18–], Seiten 413ff.).
In a still more striking manner Luther speaks of the difficulty of “rightly dividing” Law and Gospel in a practical ministration of the pastors of the church. He shows how easy it is to confound these two doctrines of Scripture in hours of trial, especially at the approach of death. He says: “Etliche lassen sich beduenken sie verstehen diese Dinge sehr wohl; ihr aber sollt euch vor der Vermessenheit heuten und gedenken, dass ihr Schueler des Wortes bleibt. Denn der Satan ist ein
solcher Meister, dass er den Unterschied sehr leichtlich aufheben und anstatt des Evangelii das Gesetz, wiederum anstatt des Gesetzes das Evangelium uns eindringen kann. Wie oft begegnet es den Leuten in den letzen Todeszuegen, dass die armen Gewissen etliche evangelische Sprueche ergreifen, welche doch eigentlich zum Gesetz gehoeren, und also der Trost des Evangelii verlieren? Wie dieser Spruch Matthew 19:17: ‘Willst du ins Leben gehen, so halte die Gebote Gottes’; dergleichen auch dieser Spruch Matthew 7:21: ‘Nicht ein jeder, der zu mir spricht: Herr, Herr, wird in das Himmelreich gehen’. Durch die und dergleichen Sprueche werden das Herzen oftmals so irre gemacht, dass sie nicht sehen, denn nur allein was sie getan haben und haetten tun sollen, item, was Gott fordert und gebeut [sic]. Wenn die Herzen solches anschauhen, vergessen sie alles das, was Christus getan und Gott verheissen hat, durch Christum zu tun. Derohalben, soll sich niemand vermessen, als haette er solches vollkoemmlich [sic] erlangt. Mit Worten kann man den Unterschied leichtlich machen, aber im Tod und in der Gefahr befindet man, wie boese dialectici wir sind, wenn eine Disputation einfaellt von dem, was wir getan haben und tun sollen, wenn uns das Gesetz verwirft, das hat dir Gott befohlen zu tun, du aber hast es nicht getan, sondern das Gegenspiel, dann musst du verdammt sei nach dem Spruch deines Gesetzgebers, Deuteronomy 27:26. Wer allhier ein geschickter dialecticus ist, der macht einen Unterschied zwischen dem Gesetz und Evangelio und gibt noch, dass er das Gesetz nicht gehalten habe, antwortet aber, dass auf das Vorhergehende das nicht die Folge sei, dass ich darum verzweifeln soll und muss verdammt sein; denn das Evangelium heisst an den Herrn Christum glauben und auf des Herrn Christi Werke und Gerechtigkeit bauen” (Band IV, Seite 2077f.).
In a brief, compact statement, Luther expresses the difference between Law and Gospel in a sermon on Genesis 15:6, 7 thus: “Gesetz ist, wenn Gott heisst tun oder lassen, und etwas von uns fordert. Evangelium ist, wenn er etwas Gutes verkuendigt, das er selbst tun und uns geben will. So gehen die zwei gar wider einander: eines treibt, das andere gibt; das fordert, jenes schenkt. So soll man alle Sprueche, die Gottes Gnade und Huld verheissen, nicht anders heissen, denn Evangelium, welches so viel heisst als eine gute Botschaft” (III, 262). Compare also IX, 802f.: “Durchs Gesetz sollanders nichts verstanden werden…. Gesetz fordert und sagt: ‘Das sollst du tun’.” “Diejenigen irren gewaltig, die hier das Joch Christi…. O Blindheit, welche sich wohl fuer solche Leute schicke die das Evangelium aus Verachtung nicht lesen wollen” (VII, 143).
The qualities of legal and evangelical promises need to be inculcated again and again. “Promissiones evangelicae non sunt conditionatae [sic],” says J. Olearius; that is, Gospel promises are in no wise dependent upon our achievements, such as good works, good conduct etc. The Scripture proof for this thesis is found in every passage in which the justification and salvation of a sinner is deduced from the grace of God to the utter exclusion of all works or merits of man. True, even orthodox theologians have said that evangelical promises are conditioned upon faith. But they have added this caution, that in such a connection, the word “condition” is not used to express a certain service which man must render before he can obtain the promise, but only the modus applicationis, i.e., the manner in which the promise is grasped and appropriated. The statement: “If you believe, you will be saved,” means “Believing you will be saved.” Compare Dr. Pieper: “Sind die Verheissungen des Evangeliums reine Gnadenverheissungen
oder irgendwie durch menschliche Leistungen bedingt?” Lehre und Wehre, Band 29 (1883), Seiten 193-199; 241-256.
Evangelical promises do not cease being gratuitous, because they must be appropriated by faith; for 1) the faith which appropriates them is itself a gift of God; 2) this appropriating faith is not a work but an agency (nicht Werk, sondern Werkzeug).
Nor does the fact that God commands us to believe, compel us to view believing as a work demanded of us (imperativus evangelicus). When demanding faith, God offers us the instrument by which we are to come into possession of His grace. Luther again says strikingly: “Darum will er sagen: Ich lege euch keine schwere Buerden und Last auf, viel Opfer oder Gottesdienst oder andere Dinge, dazu grosse Kost oder Muehe gehoert. Das Evangelium, Taufe und Sakrament habe ich euch aufgelegt; das ist kein Gebot, sondern euer Schatz, den ich euch umsonst geschenkt habe; und zwinge niemand dazu, wie Moses, mit Zwang und Strafe, sondern lasse jedermann die Wahl, wer es gern will annehmen. Es ist dir nicht geboten, dass du es muessest Gott zu dienst tun, sondern dir selbst zu gut, dass du deine Seligkeit da holest, so du anders willst selig werden” (Halle, VIII, 403).
As regards the function and office, or the application of the Law and the Gospel, that of the Law is to terrify, that of the Gospel, to assure. A question has been raised in this connection: Whether it is proper to call the Gospel in the strict sense concio poenitentiae, a preaching of repentance. The Formula of Concord says: “Therefore, in order that the two doctrines…. Reproves sin and condemns,” (Solid Declaration, Chapter V, paragraph 27, p. 549f.).
The proper addressees of legal preaching are secure sinners, of evangelical preaching, such sinners as have already been made to know their sins. Luther advises a poor sinner, who has become terrified by the Law, to put the Law entirely out of his mind. He does this in a classical passage in his Exposition of Galatians, which should be read entire. I quote only one remark: “Darum ists wohl ein Wunder, seltsam und ganz unerhoerte Sache in der Welt, dass man den Christen vorgibt und sie lehrt, dass sie des Gesetzes vergessen lernen und davon garnichts mehr wissen sollen, sondern vor Gott also leben, als ob allerdings gar kein Gesetz waere. Denn wo du des Gesetzes nicht also allerdings vergisst, dich sein abtust [sic], als waere kurz und gar kein Gesetz mehr, sondern eitel lauter Gnade, so vermagst du nicht selig zu werden. Denn durchs Gesetz kommt nur Erkenntniss der Suenden, usw. Wiederum, muss man das Gesetz und Werklehre in der Welt also treiben als waere allerdings keine Verheissung noch Gnade nicht” (IX, 20).
Baier concludes his chapter “de lege et evangelio” with the remark: “Although Law and Gospel thus differ, still in practice, there must be the closest union among them. First, in the conversion of a person, then, in his daily renewal and sanctification.”
As regards conversion, if this term is understood in the strict sense, that occurs simply by means of the believing acceptance of that grace, which is offered to the sinner in the Gospel. Nobody, however, accepts this grace, unless he has been brought by the Law, to a knowledge of his sins and of the state of damnation in which he lies under the wrath of God. Hence if any person were to remove the Law from the Church, he would thereby prevent the Gospel from exercising its
virtues. Luther says: “Die Suende und der Tod sollen darum vornehmlich dem Menschen angezeigt werden, nicht dass sie von Noethen sein zum Leben und Unschuld, sondern, dass der Mensch erkenne seine Ungerechtigkeit und damnis und also gedemuetigt werde. Wenn die Suende ueberhaupt unerkannt bleibt, ist der Mensch vermessen aud seine falsche, erdichtete Unschuld wie solches an den Pelagianern zu sehen ist.” For this reason the preaching of the Law must be maintained in the Christian Church.
Luther also insists that the effects of the preaching of the Law are divine effects of the Holy Spirit. He says: “Auch ist das falsch und erlogen, dass das Gesetz ohne den Heiligen Geist die Suende strafe, so doch das Gesetz mit den Fingern Gottes geschrieben ist, Exodus 32:16. Und alle Wahrheit, wo sie nur ist, ist von dem Heiligen Geist, und das Gesetz verbieten, ist die Wahrheir Gottes verbieten” (Walch, 20, 2040).
Lastly Luther insists that the order must always be this, that the Law is preached first, and after that the Gospel. He says: “Sie haben ihnen erdichtet einen neuen Methodum, dass man solle zuerst die Gnade predigen, darnach, Offenbarung des Zornes, auf dass man das Wort (Gesetz ) ja nicht hoeren noch reden duerfe. Das ist ein fein Katzenstuelchen, gefaellt ihnen trefflich wohl und meinen, sie wollen die ganze Schrift hinein und heraus ziehen, und damit lux mundi werden.” He points out that Paul in the opening chapters of Romans pursues just the reverse order (“Wider die Antinomer,” Walch, XX, 2024).
The Antinomian faction of his day, headed by Johann Agricola, had cited Luther’s own example, who had begun his public work of reforming the Church by preaching the Gospel. Luther replies to them that he had no need of preaching the Law, for the poor souls to whom his evangelical message came had been bruised and crushed beyond endurance by the preaching of the Law under Popery.
The Law has been called “paidagoogos eis christon” in Galatians 3:24. The Law does not lead to Christ or educate for Christ, per se, i.e., in so far as it is Law; for the Law does not preach Christ at all, nor does it work faith in Christ. But in the hand and providence of God the Law reveals to a person his sins, in order that the forgiveness may then be brought to him by the Gospel, which also induces him to accept the forgiveness. Accordingly the dogmaticians have said that the Law leads to Christ only indirectly.
As regards the daily renewal of believers, the operations of Law and Gospel must be conjoined in the following manner: 1) Also Christians still sin, and by reason of their flesh even Christians are inclined to make light of sin. Therefore, the Law must constantly reveal their sin to them, and they must use it as the mirror in which they examine their spiritual condition (usus legis paedagogicus). On the other hand, the Christian must constantly draw from the Gospel the comforting assurance that each and every sin, which besets him, is being forgiven him, yea, has been forgiven him for Christ’s sake. 2) Even Christians in so far as they are still in the flesh, are constantly prone to make mistakes in judging the good works which God demands of them. Now the Law is the unalterable norm for a life that is acceptable to God. Hence a Christian must keep on studying the Law and applying its rules to his daily tasks (tertius usus legis, seu didacticus [sic; confer ……….]). However, the strength for performing the deeds of the Law the Christian must constantly draw from the Gospel. 3) Even the Christian, in so far as he is still in his wicked flesh, needs the terrible threatening and smitings of the Law to
refrain him externally from gross sins and vices, Mark 9:42-48 (usus politicus). This bridling of the passions in us is, indeed, void of all merit and worthiness in the estimate of God; still God employs this refrenatum in His believers to the end that He may accomplish His work of grace in them.

§134. The Sacraments in General.

“Our most merciful God, taking into consideration both man’s salvation and the frailty of our faith, was not satisfied with having made manifest His more than fatherly will in the word of the Gospel promise, but over and above this, desired to set it forth to us, confirmed with external signs, in order that we might grasp with a firm and unmovable faith what is proposed to us regarding our salvation, when we behold it confirmed by an outward sign and in order that thus every doubt might be banished from our hearts. ‘If you were without a body’, says Chrysostom, ‘God would have handed His gifts over to you in some incorporeal form; however, since your soul is joined to a body, these gifts are handed over to you as matters that you must grasp with your sensibilities’. Accordingly, as God had bound man, while still in the state of integrity, to render Him obedience, both by His Word and by some outward sign, so He both restored him after the Fall, by His Word of promise, and confirmed his faith by an outward sign, when to the promise of the woman’s Seed, that is, the Messiah, who should bruise the serpent’s head, that is, destroy the works of the devil, and by His obedience and death restore our lost righteousness and life, He added an outward sign, namely the rite of offering sacrifices, which was not the invention of some human mind, but ordained by God, as we have shown by incontrovertible arguments in our treatise on the ceremonial and forensic Law…. After the Flood God extended to Noah His Word of promise and added the rainbow as a sign of His covenant with Noah, Genesis 9:13. Later there followed the institution of circumcision, Genesis 17 and of the Passover, Exodus 12, to which there succeeded in the New Testament Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, which are called ‘sacramenta sive mysteria, verba visibilia et invisibilis gratiae visibilia signa’ as Augustine calls them. For by means of them there are in a manner placed before our eyes those things, which by the Word are announced to our ears.” In this manner Gerhard seeks to explain to us the wisdom, yea, the necessity of having sacraments in addition to the Gospel Word for transmitting divine grace to sinners.
Luther expresses himself still more vigorously on this matter. “God,” he says, “has never wished to have His worship in the world without external means. In the O.T. He gave to the Jews a form of worship by which they were to find Him; there was the appointed place of the tabernacle, or the Ark of the Covenant, the altar, candlestick, the Levites; and God was not found by men except by external means and forms. He has ever proposed to them some external means by which they would surely find Him; He did not suffer them to wander about aimlessly without external means or forms. But the Jews abandoned those forms and sought out other ways, just as the fanatics in our day depart from and forsake the forms which God has appointed us in the N. T. God cannot be our God unless He offers us something external, by means of which we may find Him, as e.g., the spoken Word and the two sacraments. If I do not lay hold of God by means of some external thing, how
am I to approach Him? Accordingly, all heretics have offended against the First Commandment by their human ordinances, and have cut out the promise and grace of God contained in it; yea, they deny God Himself; they reject use and usage, thus keeping men from coming to the grace of God” (Halle, III, 250).
Again Luther says: “In all His promises God has usually given us, besides His Word, some sign, in order thereby to better secure and strengthen our faith. Thus He gave to Noah the sign of the rainbow, Genesis 9:10-13. To Abraham He gave the sign of circumcision, Genesis 17:16; to Gideon He gave dew, which descended either upon the ground or the fleece, Judges 6:37ff., and so on. Throughout the Scriptures we find many such signs accompanying His Word. Denn also tut man auch in weltlichen Testamente, dass nicht allein die Worte schriftlich verfasst, sondern auch Siegel und Notarienzeichen [sic] daran gehaenget werden, dass es je bestaendig und glaubwuerdig sei. Also hat auch Christus in diesem Testament getan und ein kraeftiges, aller edelstes Siegel und Zeichen an und in die Wort gehaenget; das ist sein eigen wahrhaftig Fleisch und Blut unter dem Brot und Wein. Denn wir arme Menschen, weil wir in den fuenf Sinnen leben, muessen je zum wenigsten ein aeusserlich Zeichen haben neben den Worten, daran wir uns halten und zusammenkommen moegen, doch also, dass dasselbe Zeichen ein Sakrament sei und doch geistliche Dinge habe und bedeute, damit wir durch das Aeusserliche in das Geistliche gezogen werden; das Aeusserliche mit den Augen des Leibes, das Geistliche innerlich mit den Augen des Herzens begreifen” (Walch, 19, 1274).
Gerhard, who has applied this rule – as we heard – to the state of innocence, holds that it may be said, without absurdity, that the tree of life was to our first parents for a sacrament; it was a symbol of immortality to them. For although that sacrament was not a remedy of sin to them as the sacraments properly so-called are now, after the Fall, still it was to them, the exponent of God’s favor.
This, then, is the logic of the sacraments: God wishes to get access to our heart with His offer of grace not only through the channels of the ear, but also through the avenue of the eye, and the passages of the touch and taste. Our whole sensible frame is to be attacked, as it were. Hence He created along side of the verbum audibile the verbum visibile, the sacrament. Hence not only the Gospel, but also the sacraments are media seu instrumenta gratiae and possess the same virtues as those we noted in our study of the Gospel, the vis collativa and the vis operativa.
At this point the ways of Lutheranism and the Reformed churches part. All the sects are rationalistic at this point, and, as usual, their rationalism is not always reasonable. They argue that God is omnipresent and that it is written, that in Him we live and move and have our being. That is true, but that does not prove that we can lay hold of Him anywhere we choose; we can find Him only by Himself manifesting Himself to us. Nor does it prove that, if we were to find Him anywhere, we would find Him a gracious God. It is necessary, then, that He indicate to us occasions and opportunities at which He will meet us in the way of grace. The sects also argue that faith is altogether an affair of the soul with which the body can have nothing to do. How is faith to enter the heart by an external sign? – they say. But has the body really nothing to do with things going on in the soul? Our daily experiences contradict this position. However, the sects seem to altogether forget that in a living human being the soul exists only in the tabernacle of the flesh,
the body, and can be approached only through the physiological channels which God has created. Souls are drifting about in this ambient ether of ours, waiting to receive impressions which likewise flit about in some mysterious way. But what chiefly divides us from the Reformed churches is the question: What view must we take of the salvation of Christ? Must we concede that grace, sufficient grace, lies ready for every sinner, now that Christ has reconciled the world with God? Is this grace prepared, offered and transferred to man even prior to any man’s faith? If a person negatives these questions, he is in a poor condition to understand the need and the usefulness of the sacraments, but if he affirms, he will think it only good and proper that God should have established many ways for transferring grace to men.
Now as to the word “sacrament,” this is a vox ecclesiastica, a church-term, not found in Scripture, an “agraphon.” The Hebrew and Greek Scriptures, of course, would not contain a Latin term, and the Latin Bible, which contains the word, is only a translation, and even if it does not use the term in the specific sense in which the Church now uses it to designate certain visible instruments for the confinement of the divine grace. Zwingli has said: “I could very much wish that the word ‘sacrament’ had never obtained acceptance with the Germans, unless they had received it germanely,” that is, in a proper sense. And he adds this reason: “Whenever they hear the word ‘sacrament’ they think at once of something great and holy, which by the virtue inherent in it is to free their conscience from guilt.” The reason which Zwingli gives for his dislike for the word really reveals his dislike for the matter expressed by the word. Carlstadt, at one time the coworker of Luther at Wittenberg, considered it his duty to make war upon the word “sacrament” on the ground that it was an unscriptural term. Luther checked the whole iconoclastic career of his erratic colleague by his treatise “Wider die himmlischen Propheten,” in which he showed amongst other things that although the term “sacrament” is “agraphos” it is not “antigraphos,” that is, the matter signified by the word is indeed found in the Scriptures.
The term “sacrament” has only gradually gained the strict and peculiar signification which it has now. We read in the profane writers that the term signified not only the sum of money which was deposited with the judge by parties in litigation, with the understanding that he, who won the case, should recover his deposit, while the deposit of the losing party was to be turned into the fiscus; but the term “sacrament” was used also to designate the guarantee which any party gave beforehand to pay a sum of money, in case he should lose his case; yea, also an oath, especially that of a soldier, was called a sacrament. Tertullian seems to have had this meaning in mind, when he applies this word for the first time among the Latin fathers, to that act by which candidates for baptism consecrate themselves to God and promise that they will faithfully and vigorously fight under the banner of Christ against Satan. He thus uses this word in his treatise “de corona militis.” Hence originated the custom of calling not only the entire rite of baptism but also that of the Lord’s Supper a sacrament, though outside of this application, the term “sacrament” was in a more general way applied to all kinds of sacred and secret matters, and to the symbol of those matters, even when they had been instituted by men. Hence the old saying: A sacrament is res quaecunque sacrata, any hallowed object.
Gerhard distinguishes a threefold usus ecclesiasticus, as regards the term “sacrament.” 1) It is used generalissime to signify anything secret or mysterious. The Vulgate uses it in 1st Timothy 3:16 (“pietatis sacramentum”), where the incarnation of the “logos” is spoken of, and in Revelation 17:7 (“sacramentum mulieris et bestiae”) where we have the mystery of the woman and the beast declared. Tertullian speaks in the broadest sense of “religionis christianae sacramentum.” Jerome says: “Sacramenta Dei sunt praedicare, benedicere ac confirmare, communionem reddere, visitare infirmos, orare.” Augustine calls any mystical or allegorical interpretation of Scripture a sacrament. 2) “Sacrament” is employed specialis for any emblem which typifies some sacred matter, even if it is only of human origin, e.g., the chrisma or unction, and signing oneself with the cross used to be called “sacrament,” also any rite connected with the administration of baptism. Accordingly, Lombardus defines sacrament by “rei sacrae signum.” 3) The term “sacrament” is used specialissime and maxime proprie for the two evangelical ordinances, which bear that name now.
In the Lutheran Church the meaning of the term “sacrament” becomes strictly limited, chiefly through Luther’s Small Catechism. Our Church has explained her position on the number and the use of the sacraments, strictly so-called, in Chapter VII of the Apology, which corresponds to Article XIII of the Augsburg Confession. In this chapter, absolution is still called the “sacrament of repentance” and “truly a sacrament” (paragraph 4, page 214); and with regard to the ordination, this statement is made:: “If ordination be understood as applying to the ministry of the Word, we are not unwilling to call ordination a sacrament” (paragraph 11, page 215). But it should be borne in mind that in Chapter IV, paragraph 60 the Apology says: “Certainly the most in our churches use the sacraments, absolution and the Lord’s Supper frequently in a year” (page 176). This shows that the Confessors understood by the sacrament of repentance really nothing else than absolution as administered in connection with the Lord’s Supper. Another explanation of this use of the term “sacrament” is suggested by Luther in his Large Catechism. He says: “Here you perceive that baptism, both in its power and significance, comprehends also the third sacrament, which has been called repentance, as it is really nothing else than baptism. For what else is repentance but an earnest attack upon the old man at the beginning of a new life? Therefore if you live in repentance, you walk in baptism, which not only signifies such a new life, but also produces, begins and exercises it” (Chapter IV, paragraph 74f., page 475). So it is Lutheran to explain the phrase “sacrament of repentance” by connecting it either with the Lord’s Supper or with Baptism and merging it in both. And as regards the concession made with reference to ordination, it admits no more than this, viz., that the term “sacrament” may be applied to it, but it does not say that ordination is a sacrament in the strict sense.
The entire paragraph is a dogmatical effort to define a sacrament in the strict sense. Such a thing as a doctrine of sacraments in general does not exist in the bible. Scripture speaks only of the actual sacraments. By studying what Scripture says of baptism and the lord’s Supper we obtain by deduction our definition of “sacrament.” Our definition, though, must contain every essential element, which according to the teaching of Scripture belongs to such an ordinance.
1. In every correct definition we have to fix, first of all, the summum genus, i.e., find a class term, under which the thing to be defined is properly grouped with other objects belonging to the same class. Next the definition must state the specific differences, that is, those qualities of the thing to be defined, which differentiate, or separate, it from every other object belonging in the same class. According to our text book, the summum genus of the definition of a sacrament is “sacred acts.” “Touto poieite” in 1st Corinthians 11:24, 25, and “baptidzontes,” in Matthew 28:19, the former relating to the Lord’s Supper, the latter to Baptism, are verbal phrases expressing action.
The Augsburg Confession in XIII calls sacraments “signa et testimonia voluntatis dei erga nos.” This is not a definition but a description of sacraments; and as a description it is scriptural; for in Romans 4:11 the Old Testament sacrament of circumcision is called “sämeion peritomäs” (epexegetical genitive), the sign consisting in circumcision. It must be shown, however, when we speak of the sacraments as signs, that whatever the gracious will of God towards us reveals as having been prepared and lying ready for us, the same thing it also gives us. When the Reformed theologians speak of the sacraments as “signa nuda,” in the sense that God, indeed, speaks to us of His grace, but does not give it to us, hence, that men can take no grace out of a sacrament by believing in it, they must necessarily assume, that God’s revelations and declarations are not reliable. For if they are, I not only may, but must take divine grace out of a sacrament, because there is no doubt that God declares and offers His grace by the sacraments.
Of course, at the base of the Reformed denial that the sacraments are means of grace there lies a wrong conception of the redemption of Christ. Many of them do not believe that God has actually been reconciled, completely reconciled with the entire world by Christ. Accordingly, they do not believe that the Gospel is God’s message telling the redeemed world of the finished salvation, or of the grace which lies ready for every man who will take it. On the contrary, they view the Gospel as an instruction from God, how the sinner by his own efforts, such as conversion, prayer, holiness of life etc., may conciliate the favor of God. If this view were correct, there would, indeed, be no grace in the Gospel, nor in the sacraments, but the sacraments would be bare emblems of grace to the sinner, that is, they would signify to man no more than this, that God would be gracious to them, provided they had met certain conditions. But if we hold that in Christ God is gracious to all sinners, then every sign or emblem of grace, that is, every contrivance, manifesting to us the gracious will of God as a present existence and reality, is truly a means of grace.
Zwingli stated: “Signa nihil quam externae res sunt, quibus in conscientia nihil afficitur.” The Reformed Confessio ad Imperatorem says: “Cred, imo certo scio, omnia sacramenta tam abesse ut gratiam conferant, ut ne afferant quidem et dispensent.” Calvin says: “Sacramentum nihil aliud est quam externa divinae erga nos benevolentiae testificatio, quae visibili signo spirituales gratias figurat.”
The Roman Church, too, defines “sacraments” by means of the summum genus, “signs,” e.g., their greatest dogmatician, Bellarmine.
While we do not deny that there is a typifying and emblematical force in sacraments, we deny that to call them
“signs” exhausts the chief element in a definition of sacrament. We rather say with Gerhard: “Sacramenta nos ponimus in praedicamento actionis et ex eodem genus definitionis petimus…. Sacramentum esse actionem probanus: 1) ex institutione divina singulorum sacramentorum, in qua Deus expresse requirit et praescribit actionem.”
2. Sacraments are sacred acts “of divine institution.” Baier says: “Requiritur ad sacramentum proprie et stricte sic dictum, 1) ut sit actio a Deo mandata.” The general commission to baptize was issued, and the Lord’s Supper was instituted by the Lord (texts under 2.), who, moreover, sealed the institution of baptism with the solemn appeal to the Trinity, and in the same connection asserted His divine sovereignty, by stating that all power in heaven and on earth was given Him, and that He would be present with those who would execute His sacramental command – to the end of the world.
God alone can be the causa efficiens principalis, the author of a sacrament, because He alone is the Author of grace, and therefore, He alone can determine the means and ways by which He is willing to confer grace and make those instruments actual vehicles of grace. When men undertake to ordain sacraments, they insult the divine majesty and become guilty of blasphemy. The Roman Church with its holy waters, blessed candles, consecrated oil, etc., which it commends to men as helps and aids to holiness, has mischievously intruded its wanton ideas into the exclusive domain of God. Luther calls this attempt “des Teufels Gaukelwerk und Affenspiel.” He says: “Da nun der Teufel sahe, dass Gott eine solche heilige Kirche bauete, feierte er nicht, und beauet seine Kapelle dabei, groesser denn Gottes Kirche ist, und taet ihm also: er sehe dass Gotte aeusserliche Dinge nahm, als Taufe, Wort, Sakrament, Schluessel usw. Dadurch er seine Kirche heiligte (wie er denn allezeit Gottes Affe ist und will alle Dinge Gotte nachtun und ein besserer machen) nahm er auch aeusserlich Ding vor sich, die sollten auch heiligen, gleichwie er tut bei den Wettermachern, Zauberern, Teufelsbannern usw.; da laesst er auch wohl das Vaterunser beten und Evangelium ueberlesen, auf dass es gross Heiligtum sei. Also hat er durch die Paepste und Papiste [sic] lassen oder weihen heiligen Wasser, Salz, Kerzen Kraeute, Glocken, Bilder, Agnus Dei, Pallia, Altar, Caseln, Platten, Finger, Haende; wer wills alles erzaehlen? Zuletzt die Moenchskappen so heiligen, dass viel Leute drin gestorben und begraben sind, als wollten sie dadurch selig werden. Nun waer das wohl fein, wenn man Gottes Wort, Segen oder Gebet ueber die Kreatur spraeche, wie die Kinder ueber Tische tun, und ueber sich selbst, wenn sie schlafen gehen und aufstehen, davon St. Paulus sagt 1st Timothy 4:5: ‘Alle Kreatur ist gut und wird geheiligt durchs Wort und Gebet’. Denn daraus kriegt die Kreatur keine neue Kraft, sondern wird bestaetigt in ihrer volligen Kraft. Aber der Teufel sucht ein anderes, sondern will, dass durch sein Affenspiel die Kreatur eine neue Kraft und Macht krieche. Gleichwie das Wasser durch Gottes Wort eine Taufe wird, ein Bad zum ewigen Leben, die Suende abwaescht und selig macht, welches ist nicht des Wassers Natur noch Macht, und Brot und Wein, Leib und Blut Christi wird, durch Auflegung der Haende Suenden vergeben werden nach Gottes Einsetzung, also will der Teufel auch, dass sein Gaukelwerk und Affenspiel kraeftig sei und ueber die Natur etwas tue. Weihwasser soll Suende tilgen, es soll Teufel austreiben, soll den Poltergeistern wehren, soll die Kindsbetterin schirmen, wie uns der Papst lehrt usw. – aquam sale; so soll Weihsalz auch tun; agnus Dei vom Papst geweiht, soll mehr tun weder Gott
selbst zu tun vermag…. Darum hat nun ecclesia, das heilige, christliche Volk, nicht schlecht aeusserliche Worte, Sakramente oder Aemter, wie der Gottes Affe, Satan, auch und viel mehr hat, sondern hat sie von Gott geboten, gestifft und geordnet; also dass er selbst (kein Engel) dadurch mit dem heiligen Geist will wirken…. Solch Stueck fehlet in des Teufels Sakramenten und Kirchen; da kann niemand sagen: Gott hats geboten, befohlen, eingesetzt, gestift, er will selber da sein und selber alles tun; sondern so muss man sagen: Gott hats nicht geboten, sondern verboten, Menschen habens erdichtet, oder vielmehr der Gottes Affe hats erdichtet, und die Leute damit verfuehret. Denn er wirket auch nicht denn was zeitlich ist oder wo es geistlich sein soll, ist eitel Truegerei. Denn er kann damit nicht ewiglich Suende vergeben und selig machen, wie er leugnet, durchs Weihwasser, Messen und Moencherei, ob er gleich kann lassen eine Kuh wieder ihre Milch kriegen, die er selbst zuvor durch seine Propheten und Pfaeffen gestohlen hat” (XVI, 2292f.).
In connection with the causa efficiens principalis of a sacrament, viz., God, the dogmaticians name also the causa impulsiva interna, which is His goodness and the causa impulsiva externa seu meritoria, which is the merit of Christ. Some have also called our human infirmity a causa “prokatarktikä,” i.e., the outward occasion.
3. Our text-book now proceeds to speak of the “proper administration” of the sacrament. This implies that there must be persons to administer a sacrament. Such a person is called in dogmatical parlance the causa minus principalis seu ministerialis. The administration of a sacrament is one of the public functions of the Christian ministry. Ordinarily, therefore, the minister or parson is the proper administrator of the sacrament. Paul clearly implies this, when in 1st Corinthians 4:1 he calls ministers “stewards of the mysteries of God.” But in an emergency, i.e., when the service of the ordained minister cannot be obtained, the sacrament may be administered by any Christian, regardless of sex or station, because the means of grace, in fact, all Christian rights and prerogatives have originally been committed, not to a particular class of men in the Church, but to the entire Church. Accordingly, when Christians in an emergency administer a sacrament, they do only what they have at all times a right to do.
The sacramental action, says Baier, should not be performed per ludum et iocum, i.e., in fun or jest; for it is a holy action and should therefore be treated as serius et sanctus. But this does not mean that the genuineness and efficacy of the sacrament depend on the personal sanctity of the administrator or on his good and proper intention. The personal quality of the administrator neither detracts from, nor adds to the dignity and power or virtue of a sacrament. It does not effect the essence of the sacrament. Whenever the sacrament has been administered according to the institution of Christ, a true sacrament has been offered. The Smalcald Articles, in the German section not translated by Jacobs, say: “Und tut die Person gar nichts zu solchem Wort und Amt, von Christo befohlen; es predige und lehre, wer es da wolle, wo Herzen sind, die es glaeuben und sich daran halten, den widerfahret, wie es hoeren und glaeuben,” M. [Die symbolischen Bücher der evangelisch-lutherischen Kirche, Herausgeber Johann Tobias Müller], Seite 333; Jacobs, page 343 [between paragraphs 26 and 27]. [Confer Philip Melanchthon, “Von der Gewalt und Oberseit des Papsts,” Concordia Triglotta, editors F. Bente and W. H. T. Dau (Saint
Louis: Concordia, 1921), paragraph 26, page 510.] Quenstedt calls the discussion about the minister’s intention while engaged in a sacramental action a disputatio intricatior. Common propriety, he holds, would indeed demand of the minister that he engage in this action with the good intention of doing what Christ has ordained should be done, and that he fix his mind on what he is doing. But if he only observe actu externo the institution of Christ, there need be no scruple in the minds of the people whether he observed the institution of Christ also actu interno. For if he did not, even if he were an infidel, he could not make the faith and grace of God of none effect, as Paul says, Romans 3:3; 11:29. Besides, if the private intention of the minister had any influence on the sacrament itself, it would follow, that in proportion as the minister’s intention was good, the effect of the sacrament would be great, which is absurd. And no one could really be assured of the blessed effects of a sacrament, unless he had previously ascertained his minister’s intention.
It is of the utmost importance to hold correct views on this matter, for the old Donatist and Anabaptist error is still prevalent, viz. that the efficacy of the sacrament depends on the personal piety of the administrant. Besides, the Roman Church has gone on record at the Council of Trent anathematizing all who deny that the intention of the minister does not belong to the integrity, genuineness and efficacy of the sacrament. In the Lutheran Church there has cropped out occasionally a Romanizing tendency, which has made the efficacy of the sacraments depend on the fact that the administrator be an ordained minister. So Grabau in his Hirtenbrief of 1840, Seite 15. All these erroneous views virtually destroy the grace of God and the means of grace, because they make them unreliable by injecting into their administration a human element, which nobody ever could control.
Luther speaks of this matter in his treatise “Von der Winkelmesse und Pfaffenweihe,” XIX, 1269f., especially paragraphs 110-114. To quote some of his vigorous statements, he says: “Es muss unser Glaube und Sakrament nicht auf der Person stehen, sie sei fromm oder boese, geweihet oder ungeweihet, berufen oder eingeschlichen, der Teufel oder seine Mutter, sondern auf Christo, auf seinem Wort, auf seinem Amt, auf seinem Befehl und Ordnung…. Die Aemter und Sakramente bleiben immerdar in der Kirche, die Personen aendern sich taeglich. Man berufe und setze nur drein die sie koennen ausrichten, so gehen und geschehen sie gewiss. Der Gaul ist gezaehmt und gesattelt, setze darauf auch einen wackeren Knaben, der reiten kann, so gehet der Gaul ebenso wohl, als wenn ihn der Kaiser oder Papst ritte.”
The Roman theologian Bellarmine has charged Luther with introducing confusion in the Church by teaching that “every baptized person has the right to administer the sacraments.” Gerhard replies to this charge and says that Luther merely asserts that baptized Christians who have been received into the divine covenant of grace possess generalem quandam aptitudinem, and are in a position to administer a sacrament, when called upon to do so, and that Luther had opposed this generalis aptitudo of all Christians to the Roman teaching of the speci character sacerdotalis of priests.
4. The proper administration of a sacrament requires that there be used 1) the prescribed external elements; 2) that there be a use of them, i.e., that there be performed a certain action, in itself indifferent, upon, or by means of, these
elements. Both the element and the action by means of the element are called the materia sacramenti. Thus water is the element, and the application of it, the action in Baptism, Ephesians 5:27; John 3:5, 23; bread and wine are the elements, and the distribution of the same, the action in the Lord’s Supper.
For elementum the dogmaticians also use these phrases: res sacramenti, materia circa quam and materia remota. The action is called materia proxima.
The question has also been debated whether in each sacrament there must be recognized a materia genuina, terrena et coelestis, a two-fold material, an earthly and a heavenly one. Since the heavenly material can be plainly shown only in the Lord’s Supper, Baier negatives this question. We shall come to this question once more in §136, 137.
5. In order that the sacraments may be properly administered, the use of the prescribed means must be “in conjunction with the divine words of institution.” This is called the forma, or formale sacramenti, that is, that which really makes the sacrament a sacrament. When the word of divine institution is lacking there may be a certain external element and also a sacred and symbolical action by means of the element, but there [will be] no sacrament. “Without the Word of God the water is simple water and no Baptism, but with the Word of God it is a water of life,” says Luther. This is Scriptural teaching, for Paul speaks of Baptism as “the washing of regeneration,” “the washing of water by the Word,” “loutron hydatos en rhämati,” Ephesians 5:26, and he names the blessings of the elements in the Eucharist and the words of Christ in recounting this institution.
6. With the visible element God is present, in a manner peculiar to each sacrament. “Water and Spirit” are therefore joined in John 3:5 as one sacramental matter out of which the new birth proceeds, and the miraculous revelation of the Trinity at the baptism of Christ shows this in a significant manner. As regards the Lord’s Supper, Scripture warns the communicants to discern “the Lord’s body” when they come to eat and drink; hence the Lord’s body must be present.
7. The sacraments are designed for men who are to “partake of them.” This is what the dogmaticians have called the finis cui or the subiectum quod of the sacraments. Only “homines carnaliter nati ac viventes,” men who have been naturally born and are living, hence not inanimate objects, like bells or ships, nor unborn infants still in their mother’s womb, not the dead in their sepulchers, are proper recipients of the sacrament. The recipient must personally enter into the sacramental action; hence he must be a living human individual.
To all who partake of the sacrament there is an offer made. This is what the dogmaticians have called the finis cuius, or the effectus of the sacrament. When the Pharisees and Lawyers declined the baptism of John, they rejected the gracious counsel of God. In that sacrament, then, the grace of God was conveyed to them. Likewise, in the Lord’s Supper the atonement of Christ is set before the communicants.
8. As particular effects of the sacraments we find named “the remission of sins,” Acts 2:38; Luke 3:3; Matthew 26:28; or the “washing away of sins,” Acts 21:16; “sanctifying, cleansing, washing,” Ephesians 5:26; the creation of [a] “good conscience towards God,” 1st Peter 3:21; “putting on Christ,”
i.e., faith, Galatians 3:26, 27. These things represent the finis cuius proximus of the sacraments.
9. The finis cuius ultimus is eternal salvation, 1st Peter 3:21; Titus 3:5.
10. And these effects are not only offered by the sacraments, but the sacraments also “operate toward the acceptance of these blessings, or toward greater assurance of their possession, e.g., actual saving, Titus 3:5; actual new birth, John 3:5, is predicated of baptism. Hence Baier says: “Finis cuius sacramentorum… est gratiae evangelicae collatio aut obsignatio.” Sacraments offer the grace of God to those who are still without it; they seal grace to those who already possess it. The sacraments, therefore, possess the same powers as the Word: the vis collativa by which they extend divine grace and the vis operativa, by which they quicken and preserve faith. “God,” says the Apology, “at the same time, by the Word and by rites, moves hearts to believe and conceive faith, just as Paul says (Romans 10:17): ‘Faith cometh by hearing’. But just as the Word enters the ears in order to strike hearts; so the rite itself meets the eyes, in order to move hearts. The effect of the Word and of the rite is the same, as it has been well said by Augustine that a sacrament is ‘a visible word’, because the rite is received by the eyes, and is, as it were, a picture of the Word, signifying the same thing as the Word. Wherefore the effect of both is the same” (Jacobs, paragraph 5, page 214).
Luther says: “We know, indeed, that external things do not save, if you receive them as externals, that is, as our own affairs; but God also works salvation through external things, and has established this order that He will not bestow His Spirit without symbols or some external thing. Hence, He instituted in the Church the ministry of the Word, Baptism and the Supper of the body and blood of His Son. Thus on the day of Pentecost the Holy Spirit was not given to, and did not descend upon the apostles in an invisible manner, but in a strong wind and in tongues of fire. Accordingly, the Sacramentarians err when they set up this false principle: No external matter is profitable for salvation. You should rather invert this principle, and say: Without an external matter there is no salvation coming to us…. For as the Holy Spirit moves men by the Word, so also by symbols, which are, so to speak, nothing else than a verbum reale, by which that which the Word declares, is set forth by the thing,” [Dr. Martin Luther’s sämmtliche Werke] Erlangen, [Band] 22, [Seite] 185.
But the sacraments are not efficacious by some magical virtue inherent in them. It is only through the word of the divine institution which is joined to the external element, that they possess virtue. Chemnitz calls them verbum promissionis evangelii vestitutum, a word of evangelical promise that has been clothed upon, and distinguished them from the verbum nudum, i.e., the mere preaching of the Gospel. He says: “In using the sacraments our faith does not seek or look for some essential virtue and efficacy that might be inherent in the external elements themselves, but in the promise, which has been attached to the sacrament, it seeks, apprehends and receives the grace of the Father, the merit of the Son and the efficacy of the Spirit.”
Carpzov says the sacraments are “non signa nuda, quae ‘sämeiootika’ tantum sunt, et rem aliquam vel repraesentant saltem et per modum notificationis indicant… sed ‘prospheromena’, quae re vera operantur organa et instrumenta”; “sacraments are not mere symbols, which are signifying something, and represent a certain matter or indicate
it, but they are vehicles, which truly operate as organs and instruments.” And he says that they operate “semel per modum physicae actionis, quatenus fidem et charismata inhaerentia sive primitus conferant ac operantur, sive iam ante datur augeant ac roborent,” they operate first after the manner of a physical action, in so far as they either confer for the first time faith and the gifts of grace inherent in them, or increase and strengthen the grace previously bestowed. “Deinde vero per modum actionis moralis, quoad iustificum bonum, quod credenti non offerunt saltem, sed fide receptum etiam conferrunt et obsignant,” in the second place, however, they operate after the manner of a moral action, so far as the justifying blessing is concerned; for they do not only offer this to the believer, but they also confer it and seal it to him as something that he has received by faith. And for this reason he notes that the Augsburg Confession calls the sacraments not only “testimonia voluntatis Dei,” but also, “instrumenta, per quae donata Spiritus Sanctus.”
Accordingly, those who argue that if the sacraments confer nothing but what is already conferred in the Word of the Gospel, they are superfluous, reveal 1) that they pose as wiser than God who has ordained the sacraments; 2) that they have no practical understanding of the manifold needs of the human heart, due to man’s natural infirmities.
But while maintaining over and against the fanatics, that the sacraments are efficacious in themselves, i.e., that they confer on each sinner the grace of God, we must at the same time maintain – over and against the Papists – that the grace offered and conferred by the sacraments can be received by men only by faith. The error of the Roman Church in this matter is that they view the sacraments as efficacious ex opere operato, i.e., by the mere external performance of the of the sacramental action, without any faith on the part of the recipient. This error entirely subverts the Christian religion, because it reduces the salvation of the sinner to the mechanical performance of certain prescribed acts. Hence Baier: “Constat quomodo sacramenta non prosint nisi intercedat fides:” it is certain that the sacraments do not benefit unless there is faith connected with them. The Apology says: “Here we condemn the whole crowd of scholastic doctors, who teach that the sacraments confer grace ex opere operato without a good disposition on the part of the one using them, provided he do [sic] not place a hindrance in the way. This is absolutely a Jewish opinion, to hold that we are justified by a ceremony, without a good disposition of heart, i.e. without faith” [Jacobs, paragraph 18], page 216. Confer Augsburg Confession, Article XIII, paragraphs 2, 3, page 41. Luther writes: “They (that) say the sacraments benefit all, even the wicked and unbelieving, provided only they do not place a hindrance in the way, as if unbelief were not itself the most hostile and obstinate obstacle to grace; and thus they have attempted to make out of these sacraments a Law, and out of faith a work. For if the sacrament confer grace on me, because of my receiving it, then I obtain grace by my action and not by faith.”
A peculiar error of modern theologians in the Lutheran Church deserves to be noted. They distinguish the effects of the sacraments from those of the Word. The effects of the sacraments have been impressed upon the natural life of the recipient. Luthardt: “Die moderne lutherische Theologie sucht eine spezifische Gabe und Wirkung des Sakraments von der des Wortes zu gewinnen. Vgl. Hoefling: ‘eine ganz concentrische unmittelbare Wirkung nicht blos auf den Geist und die
geistliche Persoenlichkeit, sondern auf die ganze dieser zu Grunde liegende geistliche und leibliche Natur des Menschen’.” Thomasius: “Waehrend das Wort mit seinem Zeugniss sich an die selbstbewusste Persoenlichkeit des Menschen wendet, um auf sie und mittelst ihrer auf den ganzen Menschen zu wirken, wendet sich das Sakrament an die menschliche Natur, unter der wir aber – was wir hier geflissentlich wiederholen – keineswegs blos die Leiblichkeit verstehen, sondern den ganzen geistleiblichen Wesensbestand des Menschen, welchen das ich reflektierend eben so von sich unterscheidet, als es sich mit ihm zur Einigkeit zusammengeschlossen weiss. Auf diese Seite des menschlichen Seins, auf diese Gebiet, das sich dem Bewusstsein nie voellig erschliesst und doch in einem innigem Rapport mit ihm steht, bezieht sich unmittelbar die Wirkung der Sakramente…. Eben deshalb ist die Wirkungsweise der Sakramente eine andersartige, als die des Wortes. Das Wort wirkt, weil auf die selbstbewusste menschliche Persoenlichkeit, psychologisch, d.h., sich anschliessend an das dem menschlichen Geiste eingeborene Gesetz, durch die Organ desselben, durch Intelligenz und Wille hindurch, auf das Herz; und es wirket eben desshalb auch successivo, auf dem Wege allmaehlicher Entfaltung…. Das Sakrament, hingegen, wirkt, weil auf die Natur, concentrisch, drastisch, mit einem Male; mittelst eines Aktes pflanzt die Taufe den Menschen vollstaendig in Christum und in seine Gemeinschaft. Waehrend sich dort, bei dem Wort, die Wirkung in die Breite auseinanderlegt, fasst sie sich hier in den Akt eines sakramentlichen Vollzugs zusammen, und waehrend dort das Resultat ein neues Verhalten der Persoenlichkeit ist, ist es hier ein neues Verhaeltniss zu Christus, in das der ganze Mensch versetzt und welches ihm zu erfahren gegeben wird.” The fundamental thought of Thomasius in these words is: There is in man, besides his self-conscious personality, an unconscious physical life, which lies dormant, as it were, beneath the conscious life. Upon this physical life the sacrament exerts an immediate influence. It operates in a physical-chemical manner, regardless of the recipient’s faith, just as a drug operates upon the physical organism even of a sleeping patient. And it produces a new relation between the recipient and God. Hence modern theologians in Germany have claimed, that perfect infidels are still members of the Church, because they were baptized. In baptism they received a certain impress, of which they cannot rid themselves, even when they apostatize from faith. This is all a mistake. A new relationship has been established between God and the sinner by the life and death of Christ. The Gospel and the sacraments reveal this new relationship to us as a fact and make us familiar with it as with something already established. In conclusion, I wish to cite a word of Luther on the relative necessity of the Word and the sacraments: “The Word of God is the greatest, most necessary and most important matter in the Christian Church, for the sacraments could not be without the Word, while the Word can be without the sacraments; and a person may, in an emergency, be without the sacraments, though he cannot be without the Word, as happens when a person dies before he can receive baptism.” He considers it a greater miracle of Christ than others, that in the Roman Church the text of the Gospel was read and proclaimed not only in the Latin but also in the vernacular tongue of particular countries, while the sacraments have been administered by that Church always in the Latin tongue, which was unknown to most of its members. (Siehe Winkelmesse und Pfaffenweihe.)
We may apply this observation also to the Reformed Churches. They never point a sinner to grace, which had been conferred on him already at his baptism, and yet many are saved also in the Reformed Churches. This is because they still preach the Gospel, and therewith the full grace of God. Every evangelical promise contains the entire grace necessary for salvation. Hence though they have practically abolished the sacraments, that has not destroyed the efficacy of the Word.

§135. The Sacraments of the Christian Church.

Sacraments, properly so-called, were in use by divine appointment also in the O.T. Church. These were 1) circumcision, which may be defined as a sacred act, divinely instituted by which God, through the amputation of the foreskin, His Word of institution being added thereto, bestowed on male infants in Israel and their domestics and proselytes faith, while He sealed and confirmed faith by this sacrament in adults, to the end that they might obtain remission of their sins and everlasting salvation; 2) the Passover, or Paschal Lamb, which may be defined as a sacred act, divinely instituted, by which a lamb or kid, without blemish and one year old, was separated from the flock, slaughtered, roasted and eaten by the Israelites and their circumcised proselytes, while its blood was spread upon the posts and lintels of their doors, for the purpose of arousing in them faith in the Messiah, and that they might obtain and glorify the grace of God, the remission of the plague, and finally be saved forever.
These sacraments were shadows and types which have been abolished, now that the substance and the antitype has appeared in our Lord Christ. Hence Baptism takes the place of circumcision, for Paul says: “Ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ, buried with Him in baptism,” etc., Colossians 2:11, 12. And the Lord’s Supper is directly called a “kainä diathäkä,” a new covenant, because it takes the place of the ancient Passover, and was even instituted in the night of the Passover. Christ, who is the Redeemer in both covenants, received both the sacraments of the Old and those of the New Testaments, which latter He ordained. Baptism and the Lord’s Supper are the only sacraments, properly so-called of the Christian Church; because only to these ordinances belong all the essential marks and characteristics of a sacrament, as the Scriptures declare them. Since the days of Petrus Lombardus, the Roman Catholic Church has taught that there are seven sacraments strictly so-called: baptism, confirmation, eucharist, penitence, ordination, extreme unction, matrimony. The Council of Trent has made this teaching mandatory on all Christians and anathematized all who refuse to accept it. The Lutheran G. Calixt, in his controversy with the Roman theologians of Mainz, admitted that the definite number of sacraments could not be established from Scripture. Of the two sacraments of the Christian Church baptism has been called sacramentum initiationis, the Lord’s Supper, sacramentum confirmationis.

§136. Baptism.

The term “baptism” is the Anglicized form of the Greek “baptisma” or “baptismos.” These Greek words are verbal nouns derived from “baptidzoo,” which again is the intensive form of “baptoo.” “…….ó. denotes the act as a fact, .á…… the result of the act,” Hermann Cremer [Biblico-Theological Lexicon of New Testament Greek, translator William Urwick (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1977), page 130]. Plummer gives a different explanation, which, however, is not necessarily contrary to that of Cremer. He infers from Mark 7:4 and Hebrews 9:10 that “baptismos” usually denoted the ceremonial washings and lustrations prescribed for the Jews, while “baptisma,” according to Romans 6:4; Ephesians 4:5; 1st Peter 3:21, is Baptism proper [The Reverend Alfred Plummer, “Baptism,” A Dictionary of the Bible, editor John Hastings, Volume I (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1908), page 238B].
In the majority of biblical instances the verbs and nouns denoting Baptism are used in a literal sense and signify the application of water to an object or a person for a certain purpose. Such literal baptisms were the ceremonial washings of the Jews, the baptism of proselytes to the Jewish faith, which was common in the days of Christ, the Baptism of John and the disciples of Christ prior to the Day of Pentecost and the Christian sacrament of Baptism. In all these baptisms water was actually used; and a baptism of this sort, accordingly, was called baptismus luminis.
But there are Bible passages in which the term “baptism” is used in a figurative meaning. In figurative baptisms there is no water used. E.g., the sufferings which overwhelmed Christ in His passion, and which were endured by His followers, especially the holy martyrs, are called a baptism in Matthew 20:22; Mark 10:38; Luke 12:50 (baptismus sanguinis); the outpouring of the miraculous gifts of the Holy Ghost, which was a characteristic phenomenon of primitive Christianity, is called a baptism, Matthew 3:12; Mark 1:8; Luke 3:16; Acts 1:8: 11:16 (baptismus flaminis). Some commentators have even understood the term “baptism” in Matthew 21:25; Mark 9:50; Acts 18:25; 1st Corinthians 10:2, where the baptism of John and unto Moses were mentioned in a synecdochical sense, interpreting them to mean “the doctrine of these men,” of which baptism was a prominent feature (baptismus luminis).
We have now to do with that literal baptism which represents the first sacrament of the Christian Church.
1.-4. This sacrament is defined in our textbook 1) as the act of applying water to a person.
4. Water is mentioned as the materiale baptismi in John 1:31 where John the Baptist declares: “älthon egoo en [Tischendorf] hydati baptidzoon.” As one reason why the Baptist had chosen Aenon for the scene of his activity, we are told: “hoti hydata polla än ekei, John 3:23. And Christ in His conversation with Nicodemus evidently refers to this baptism of John, which was then a leading topic of debate among the Jews, as the means of the new birth, which is to be “ex hydatos kai pneumatos,” John 3:5.
But also the baptism which Peter administered to Cornelius and his household was a baptism with water; for Peter addresses himself to the baptismal action with the words “Mäti to hydoor dynatai koolysai [T.] tis tou mä baptisthänai toutous, Acts 10:47; at the baptism which Philip administered to the Ethiopian, we are told: “katebäsan amphoteroi eis to
hydoor, ho te Philippos kai ho eunouchos, kai ebaptisen auton,” Acts 8:38.
That water was used by divine command as the res terrena corporea et sensibilis in baptism, John stated clearly to the multitude, John 1:33, and the apostles plainly imply that their Lord, in raising the baptism of John to the badge of discipleship in the new Church, had not changed the physical element of baptism; for they all baptized with water, and we have no record of their having used any other element. Christian Baptism in the days of St. Paul, therefore, could be paraphrased as “loutroo tou hydatos en rhämati,” Ephesians 5:26, and when Peter compares Christian Baptism to the Flood in the days of Noah, he does not omit to show what an important part the element of water plays on either occasion, 1st Peter 3:21. Luther, therefore, is correct when he says: “Baptism is the water comprehended [included] in God’s command.” In the very word “baptidzoo” and “baptisma” the element of water is implied. If the Lord had intended any other physical substance, he would have named it; for when He spoke of “baptidzoo,” He had to expect that everybody would understand that that must be performed with water.
Hollaz has indulged his pious mind in an interesting meditation on the reason why God should have selected just water for baptism. He says: The reason is, indeed, not revealed in the Word of God. But we may consider the choice of this particular element a most wise one: 1) because water is a medium “polykoinon,” omnibus nationibus obvium; it is the most easily obtainable element everywhere in the world. 2) Water serves in a striking manner to symbolize to us the person and work of the Spirit. The Father may be called the Fountain-head of the Deity, the Son the Mouth of the Spring, the Spirit – the crystalline river gushing forth from the Father and the Son. 3) Water cleanses the body; baptism conveying the Spirit to us, cleanses the soul. Water slacks our thirst, refreshes drooping plants and makes trees sprout; the memory of our baptism stills the thirst of our soul, revives us when we are pining in sadness and produces in us the daily fruits of repentance. Water cools and chills; baptism is capable of freezing in us the hot lusts and passions raging in our flesh.
If any other liquid or any other material is substituted in the place of water, the substantia baptismis is altered, and there is no sacrament. It is, however, of no importance whether the water be taken out of a spring, well, cistern, river, pond, sea or ocean; nor whether it is rain water, or the collected dew of the morning; nor whether it is hot, cold or tepid. But the sense of propriety has led our dogmaticians to insist on aqua pura, and to reject water with an admixture of salt and water, containing vegetables and meat or any other substance.
A Hebrew youth had been baptized in an arid desert by having sand sprinkled thrice on his head. Bishop Dionysius of Ascalon ruled that this was no baptism and sent the youth to the Jordan to be baptized. Church historians record as a mark of the saeculum obscurum that a Roman pontiff could forget himself so far, as to permit a baptism with wine in the case of a sick person. In the early days of the Reformation a midwife at Kahla on the Saal had baptized some puny infants by merely pronouncing the baptismal formula over them, claiming she had baptized the infants with the Word. Luther and Bugenhagen, to whom the matter was referred, ruled: “Verbum Dei non sufficere, sed simul aquam in sacramento adesse debere.” Seckendorf relates that similar cases occurred
in Holsatia, and drew a similar censure from Luther and Bugenhagen. Deyling expresses his amazement that the Reformed theologian Beza said: “Ego quovis alio liquore non minus rite, quam aqua, baptizarim.” Bellarmine raises the grave charge against Luther of having said: “Quicquid balnei nomine appellari potest, illud esse aquam ad baptizandum, sive sit vinum, sive lac, sive cerevisia.” Gerhard defends Luther against this Roman cavil 1) by pointing out that the report that Luther said this is taken from his Table-talk, a book which Luther never acknowledged. 2) that at a baptism in Dessau Luther said: “Esto, persona sit impia et incredula, dummodo institutionem Christi inviolatam servet, et non vino, cerevisia, lixivio vel alia quapiam re, sed aqua cum adjuncto verbi Dei ututur, tunc est et vocatur sacrum baptisma,” Erlangen Ausgabe, Band 19, Seite 81 [Dr. Martin Luther’s sämmtliche Werke (Erlangen: verschieden Verlage)].
1. 2. The divine institution must not only fix the materiale of baptism, but also name or indicate the action to be performed with the element. And in regard to the action it must name both the speciem actum, i.e., what kind of an action is intended, and exercitum actum, i.e., that this action must always be performed when the sacrament is administered. As regards baptism, both the species and the exercitus actus are indicated in the verbs used to describe the baptismal act. These verbs and phrases are: “baptidzoo,” baptize, 1st Corinthians 10:2; Acts 2:41; 10:47; Matthew 3:11; “rhantidzoo,” sprinkle, Hebrews 9:19; 10:22; [“baptidzoo”] wash, Mark 7:4; “louein hydati katharoo,” wash with pure water, Hebrews 10:22. These texts refer both to the sacrament of baptism and to the ceremonial washings of the Jews, of which there were a great number, so that Hebrews 9:10 speaks of “diaphthoroi baptismoi,” divers washings, and Mark 7:4 mentions even the “baptismos potärioon kai xestoon kai chalkioon.” When the cloudy pillar hovered over the army of Israel at the Exodus, Israel was said to be baptized in the cloud, yea, also in the sea, which cast its spray upon the Israelites as they passed through it, 1st Corinthians 10:2. The blood of the covenant was sprinkled by means of a brush or feathery device upon the book and the people, Hebrews 9:19, 20, and this action is expressed in Exodus 24:6-8 by “dsarak,” sprinkle. When our Lord ordered the leper, Luke 5:14, to offer for his cleansing, “peri tou katharismou,” He referred to the ordinances in Numbers 8:7 and 19:18, 19, where “taher” is used for “cleanse,” and “chata” and “hazah” [Hiphil of …] for sprinkle and purify, “tabal” for dip, “cabas” for wash, “rachaz” for bathe, and there is an unmistakable reference to baptism of the New Testament in Ezekiel 36:25, where we find “dsarak” for sprinkle, “athah” for cleanse. In Proverbs 1:23 and Job 2:28 the New Testament miracle of Pentecost is allured to, and the terms are “abah” and “shaphan.”
If, now, the lexicons are consulted, we find that “taher” means to become clean or pure, and in the Piel to cleanse or purify physically as metals from dross, a land from corpses, the heavens from clouds; or Levitically, used of things or persons; or morally. “Chata” means to offer a sacrifice for expiation or purification; “tabal” to dip, dip in, immerse; “cabas” to wash or cleanse, as garments by kneading them in a trough, as “rachaz,” which means to lave or wash the body (plynein and louein). “Dsarak” means to scatter, sprinkle, as dust, cinders, soot, coals, water, blood (spargere). “Shaphan” signifies to pour out, as a libation, metal, dust, one’s soul, water etc. The same diversity of meaning and application attaches to the Greek
words. In particular, the Greek verb from which our English “baptism” has been formed, is used by Greek writers in classical antiquity, in the Septuagint, and in the New Testament with a great latitude of meaning. It is not possible to exhaust their meaning by any single English term. The action which the Greek words express may be performed by plunging, drenching, staining, dipping, sprinkling. Wherever words denoting baptism occur in the N. T., the context, or in the case of quotations, a comparison with the O. T., will in many instances suggest which one of the various renderings should be adopted. But there will be in every cataloging of the respective passages a number of texts in which the particular form of the act of baptism remains in doubt. Accordingly, the Presbyterian dogmatician Hodge says: “The assertion that the command to baptize is a command to immerse is utterly unauthorized.” Baier speaks of the act of applying the water as “actus abluendi, qui vel immergendo vel aspergendo, semel aut tribus vicibus fieri potest.” This means that the mode of baptism is indifferent. Baier points out that these two points prove his claim: 1) the “vis vocis ‘baptismi’,” the native force of the term baptism and baptizing, which admits of various meanings, hence, the action described by these words may take on various forms; 2) the “institutio sacramenti, quae neutrum modum determinavit.” He also holds that he may safely infer that such baptisms as those of Saul or Paul which took place in the house of Judas, Acts 9:11, 18, and that of Cornelius and his household, which likewise was a domestic baptism, the mode of sprinkling or pouring, not that of immersion, was used; for he says, “quos in aquam fuisse demissos, vix satis rationabiliter affrimari, certe non ostendi potest.” And he adds this practical reason against immersion: “In locis septentrionalibus autem ac tempore frigidiore, praesertim quoad infantum corpora tenella aspersio loco immersionis maerto adhibetur.” Gerhard adds the following reasons against immersion: 1) he holds with Baier “in verbis institutionis nullum de eo extat praeceptum,” and adds “in actione sacramenti distinguendum est inter ‘dosin’ et ‘doseoos tropon’, inter ‘läpsin’ et ‘läpseoos tropon’; ‘dosis kai läpsis’ necessaria sunt; ‘tropos doseoos kai läpseoos’ arbitrarius.” This always must be looked upon as the strongest reason; for if the Lord had considered the mode of baptism as essential as most of the modern Baptists, He would certainly have made it quite plain in the words of the institution that He wants men immersed. 2) Gerhard says, total immersion of the entire body is not necessary as a symbolical action; for baptism does not signify the putting off of the filth of the flesh, which would require, indeed, that the whole body be put under the water and rubbed; but it signifies regeneration or purification from every impurity of sin. And although regeneration pertains to the entire man, it is not necessary that the entire body be washed, because the regenerating power is not in the water, but is from the Holy Spirit, who acts by means of the water, sanctified by means of the Word and reaches the entire man even by approaching directly only one member. Thus in circumcision only one member was approached, and in sprinkling the congregation with the blood of the covenant, all were said to have been sprinkled, even though not everyone had been totally immersed. The Baptists find a great argument in favor of immersion in Romans 6:3, 4, where St. Paul compares baptism to the burial of Christ. They argue that this figure finds no expression in aspersion. We should not hesitate to admit that immersion is an admissible [mode], and that it was a customary mode of baptism in the ancient church, but
we do not grant that it is a necessary mode. For the baptism of the 3,000 in Acts 2:38 cannot easily be proven to have been by immersion, and that was administered by the apostles themselves. Moreover, it is certain that as late as the days of Cyprian clinical baptism, i.e., baptism of invalids who were bedfast, and of infants, was performed by sprinkling. (See Cyprian’s Works, edited by Erasmus, page 132.) Hence in the very earliest times the church did not consider immersion compulsory. Lastly, the Scriptures contain fine figures also which can correspond to aspersion, e.g., 1st Peter 1:2; 1st John 1:8, and in Colossians 2:12, where the burial of Christ is again compared to our baptism, baptism is also compared to the O. T. sacrament of circumcision, which certainly did not affect the entire body.
Luther has been cited as favoring immersion, but the claim is overdrawn. His exact words read: “Ich wollte, man tauchte die, welche getauft werden sollen, ganz und gar in das Wasser, wie das Wort lautet und das Geheimniss bedeutet. Nicht dass ich es fuer noetig achte, sondern dass es schoen waere, wenn einem so ganz vollkommenen Dinge auch ein vollkommenes Zeichen gegeben wuerde” (Erlangen Ausgabe, Band 19, Seite 66). In a letter to the Elector John Frederic of 1542, Luther says: “Das Woertlein ‘taufen’ bringt mit sich Wasser, denn es heisst baden, oder eintauchen, oder nassmachen mit Wasser” (Halle, 10, 2615f.).
On the question whether the water must be applied three times (trine immersion, sprinkling), Baier says: “Scriptura nihil determinat.” A single application may symbolize the unity of the divine essence, while a threefold application symbolizes the three persons of the Trinity, which fundamental article of the Christian religion is attacked by many heretics.
In regard to all these questions the Lutheran pastor should follow the custom prevailing in his locality and be careful not to disturb the minds of the faithful by innovations, or expose himself to the charge that by discarding time-honored Lutheran customs he has discarded Lutheran doctrine or is leaning to false views regarding baptism.
The question whether we must recognize and define in baptism also a materia coelestis distinct from the materia terrestris, the water and belonging to the substance of the sacrament, was not discussed at all by the older teachers of our Church. In the Smalcald Articles our Church – after Luther – simply states “Baptism is nothing else but the Word of God (with mersion) in the water, commanded by his institution, or as Paul says: ‘A washing in the Word’; just as Augustine also says: ‘The Word comes to the element, and it becomes a sacrament’,” [Jacobs,] page 330. “It is manifest from these words,” says Baier, “that Luther has taught, that the entire essence of baptism is contained 1) in the water, 2) in the action of merging [mergo] or washing, 3) in the Word of institution, in such a way that the water and the action performed with the water obtains the character of a sacrament by the word of institution which comes to it. This is the same as saying that the materia of the sacrament is the water together with the act of washing; the form of the sacrament, however, or that which gives the sacrament its real being is the word of institution. In his larger Catechism Luther says: “When asked what baptism is, answer, that it is not simply water, but water comprehended [included] in God’s Word and commandment, and sanctified thereby, so that it is nothing else than a divine water; not that the water in itself is better than other water, but that God’s Word and commandment are added,” [Jacobs,] page 467. To
these simple statements, which, by the way, found their most succinct utterance in the Small Catechism of Luther, all the other teachers of our Church, Sacerius, Wiegand, Chemnitz, Selnecker, Hesshusius, Jac. Andreae, Heerbrand have adhered. At the Colloquy of Mömpelgard between the Lutheran theologians, J. Andreae and Luc. Osiander and the Reformed Beza, the question was first raised whether a distinct heavenly element must not be defined in baptism, just as in the Lord’s Supper. Beza claimed that the blood of Christ was that materia coelestis. The question was then taken up by the theologians and other heavenly elements were defended, e.g., the Holy Trinity and the Holy Spirit; also whether we must teach a sacramental union in baptism between the water and the blood of Christ, or the Trinity, or the Holy Spirit, just as we teach a sacramental union of the body and blood of Christ with the bread and wine in the Lord’s Supper; also whether there must be a formal consecration of the water at baptism, just as there is a consecration of the bread and wine in the Lord’s Supper. The history of this interesting but useless discussion is given by Baier with Walther’s excerpts [Johann Wilhelm Baier and C. F. W. Walther, Compendium theologiae positivae, volumen III (Saint Louis: Concordia, 1879)], paginae 447-456. It is plain that the whole effort was an extreme attempt to make baptism harmonize with the Lord’s Supper in every point. Jac. Andreae was right when he said to Beza that each sacrament must be separately studied from Scripture, and only such things can be treated in connection with each sacrament as Scripture has stated concerning each.
3. In this section we must treat of the finis cui of baptism, or of its subjects, that is, those for whom the sacrament was instituted. Our textbook says, baptism must be applied to “a living human person.” Baier says: “Subiectum baptismi sunt homines carnaliter genit editique in lucem, atque hi omnes, masculi pariter et femellae; nec solum adultiones, verum etiam infantes.” We shall examine first the proof texts on this point. In Matthew 28:19 “panta ta ethnä,” without any distinction of sex, rank, social station, or age are mentioned as the subjects of baptism. The words “unto the end of the world” show that this is to remain a permanent ordinance in the Church to the end of time. This is of the utmost importance, because this text contains the baptismal command, by which baptism was instituted for the followers of Christ. If any exception has been contemplated by our Lord – this surely would have been the place to indicate it. In Acts 8:35-38 we have the account of the baptism of an adult person of a different nation and church than the Jewish. In Acts 16:15, 33 we have record of the baptism of the household of Lydia and the jailer at Philippi. Especially in the latter case, the expression “he and all his” is strong presumptive evidence that children and young persons were baptized with adults. John 3:5, 6 contrasts the new birth effected by baptism with man’s natural birth and declares baptism to be necessary for any one (“tis”). The texts Mark 10:14; Acts 2:39 show that the religion of Jesus Christ provides also for children and infants, and baptism is easily seen to be the most convenient, if not the only way to convey saving grace to children. Lastly, Colossians 2:11, 12 connects Christian baptism with the O. T. circumcision, and that was appointed to infants.
We note that in each case there is a “personale obiectum,” a person, an individual that is regarded as a proper object for baptism. And this individual is a “living human being, fully passed through the natural birth.” Hence 1) unborn
infants are not to be baptized. “Qui nondum perfecti nati sunt, renasci per baptismum non iuberetur,” Baier. “Ac ne foetus quidem humani omnes, nisi, eos vivos ac vere homines esse, constet,” Baier. 2) inanimate objects, like bells and ships cannot be baptized. Quenstedt relates that in Popery this used to be done with all the rites which accompany the administration of the sacrament. The name of the Trinity would be invoked, a name would be given to the ship or bell, and sponsors would be appointed. Emperor Charlemagne found it necessary in his time to issue the order: “Ne cloccas baptizent.” The superstitious laymen in the Catholic countries were taught to believe that baptized bells possessed extraordinary virtue for driving out demons and checking their assaults, for averting lightnings and thunderstorms, and for helping departing souls on their flight to eternity. 3) the dead cannot receive baptism. It appears from a decree of the Council of Carthage that this was practiced and forbidden in the early Church. Chrysostom expresses his opinion on this custom thus: “hoc nihi esse aliud, quam sancta in terram proicere.” What the “baptism for the dead” mentioned in 1st Corinthians 15:29 really was has not been sufficiently explained. Some think that it was a baptism performed at the graves of the departed saints, martyrs etc. Others, considering the force of “hyper” in this text, believe that it was a baptism by proxy, a survivor being baptized for a dead friend, in order to procure for him some blessing in the hereafter. The most reasonable explanation is that the early Christians occasionally sought baptism amid the graves, however, only in order to emphatically declare their belief in the resurrection of the dead, and in the fact that their baptism was a means to make that resurrection a blessed event for them.
The Church has had to wage a serious controversy in all ages against those who reject infant baptism. These people have even coined a special name which they apply to those who teach infant baptism: they call them pedo-baptists. To the Bible arguments which are already noted under 4., Baier adds Ephesians 5:26, and reasons thus: “If the entire Church is cleansed with the washing of the water by the Word, either children and infants cannot become members of the Church, or they must be baptized.” Quenstedt adds 1st Peter 3:21 and argues: If at the time of the Flood it was necessary to enter the Ark to be saved, it is equally necessary to be baptized, for the Flood prefigured baptism. Luther says in the Large Catechism: “That the baptism of infants is pleasing to Christ is sufficiently proved from his own work, namely, that God sanctifies many of them who have been thus baptized, and has given them the Holy Ghost; and that there are yet many even today in both whose life and doctrine we perceive that they have the Holy Ghost; as it is also given to us by the grace of God that we can explain the Scriptures and come to the knowledge of Christ, which is impossible without the Holy Ghost. But if God did not accept the baptism of infants, he would not give the Holy Ghost nor any part thereof to any of them; therefore during this long time unto this day no man upon earth could have been a Christian. But since God confirms baptism by the gift of his Holy Ghost, as is plainly perceptible in some of the Church Fathers, as St. Bernard, Gerson, John Huss and others, who were baptized in infancy, and since the holy Christian Church cannot perish until the end of the world, they must acknowledge that such infant baptism is pleasing to God. For he can never be opposed to himself, or support falsehood and wickedness, or for its promotion impart his grace and Spirit. This is indeed the
best and strongest proof for the simple-minded and unlearned. For they shall not take from us or overthrow this article: ‘I believe in a holy Christian Church, the communion of saints’,” [Jacobs,] page 471f.
The Baptists argue that Christ ordered His disciples first to teach, then to baptize. The Greek text upsets this argument entirely. The word “teach” occurs twice in the English rendering of Matthew 28:19, 20, but in the Greek two different words are used, “mathäteusate,” which means “make disciples” and “didaskontes,” “teaching.” Our Lord’s command, literally rendered, reads: “Go, make disciples, baptizing and teaching.” “Mathäteusate” is the imperative, and names the action, which He wants them to engage in. The next two verbs are participles and show the manner in which the action commanded is to be carried out, and of these two participles “baptidzontes” comes before “didaskontes”; so that the Baptist argument turns out the very opposite from what they claim, if any one were to prove from this text which must come first, teaching or baptizing. We Lutherans do not claim that baptizing must come first and that this text proves our claim. We know that in the early days of the Church, when the Church was to be planted, the apostles’ ministrations were chiefly to adults, and that in such cases teaching was the first duty, as it still is with us. But even in those early days Christian adults who had received the apostles’ doctrine and now were to receive the seal of the N. T. covenant in baptism, would constantly wish to take their children and infants with them. The O. T. dispensation had made provision for the children of God’s people. Was the N. T. dispensation to be inferior to the old in this respect? We are assured that among the 3,000 who received baptism on Pentecost Day, there were entire families with children, likewise at the baptism in Lydia’s, Stephanas’ and the Philippian jailor’s house. And when the apostles on such occasions baptized adults and infants alike, they could point to the very language of Matthew 28:19, 20, and say: “Our Lord has ordered us to make disciples both by baptizing and teaching, and has laid down no law as to which of these must precede the other. We must be guided by circumstances in each case. Whenever we cannot teach, while we can baptize, it would be wrong for us to argue: ‘Because I cannot teach, I will not baptize’, for there would be our Lord’s command, bidding us to make disciples by baptizing. Accordingly, we shall baptize now and bide our time until we may also teach those whom we have baptized. Wherever we cannot baptize, while we may teach, it would, again, be wrong for us to argue: ‘Because I cannot baptize, therefore I will not teach’, for there is our Lord’s command that we must make disciples by teaching. Accordingly, we shall teach with the aim of leading our pupils to baptism.” Another argument of the Baptists is taken from the fact that Christ was not baptized until He was 30 years old. Their old argument used to be put in these words: “Omnis Christi actio est nostra institutio.” We might defeat this argument by a simple reductio ad absurdum, and say to the Baptists: “If you sincerely hold that it is a divine Law that Christians must imitate in every detail every action of Christ, why then do you baptize people who are less than 30 years old, or over 30? Are you not doing wrong, according to your own belief, in every such case? And don’t you prove by breaking your own principles that your principle never was meant as an honest rule?” We may note that a small number of extreme Anabaptists in Reformation times actually tried to carry out this age rule in regard to baptism, and never baptized a person
under 30 years. But even these people could never be sure that they had carried out the will of God. For if this were the will of God, that every person to be baptized must be as old as Christ, we would think that that should mean he must be exactly as old, not merely about as old as Christ. In other words, we should have to find out the date of Christ’s baptism and perhaps also the hour and the minute. We have here an example to what fallacies fanaticism leads men. The reason why Christ was baptized when He was 30 years old, was because baptism was not proclaimed by John as a divine ordinance prior to that. Christ, however, was circumcised when He was 8 days old, and we know that Christian baptism takes the place of the O. T. circumcision. Moreover, there is a difference of purpose in the baptism of Christ and our own. Christ’s was that He might fulfill all righteousness, ours that we may wash away our sins. Christ’s could be safely postponed to such a time as He chose to have it administered, ours can never be safely postponed a day. Lastly, we have no record that John, who baptized Christ when He was 30 years old, ever refused to baptize a person who had not yet reached, or who had already passed that age.
However, the most efficient argument of the Baptists against infant baptism is that infants cannot believe, and hence, cannot be benefitted by being baptized. It is certainly true that no sacrament works ex opere operato; for the saving reception of it, faith is required in every case. But Scripture has expressly stated, not only that children, and also very young children, infants, “ta brephä,” Luke 18:14, can, but also that they actually do believe, Matthew 18:6; Mark 9:42. Furthermore, Scripture ascribes to children and babes and sucklings things which are unquestionably effects of faith, e.g., praise has been ordained out of their mouths, Psalm 8:3; theirs is the Kingdom of heaven, Mark 10:14; they are addressed by John in his epistle (1st John 2:14). But the Baptists say to us: How can you Lutherans know and comprehend this matter? Do you honestly and truly believe that infants believe? We answer: “If logical comprehension and empirical knowledge were required of us, we would have to say that we do not know and cannot comprehend how an infant can believe.” But we would go further and say: “We cannot understand and comprehend how the Bible came to be written, word for word, by inspiration of the Holy Ghost, how the world was created in 6 days, how the eternal Son of God could enter the womb of the Virgin Mary, how three divine Persons can be one divine essence, etc. In other words, if we must drop all that we fail to understand and comprehend, there will be precious little left of Christian teachings after we have eliminated all; in fact, there is not anything that we really, truly, fully understand and comprehend.” But when we are asked whether we can believe that infants believe, we say: “Yes, on the authority of God and His Scripture we can and do believe this just as we believe other wonderful things which our God does.” Luther says: “What is there to be wondered at, when the Holy Spirit is efficacious in infants in a way that we do not understand? For they have life, flesh and bones when they are in their mothers’ womb and yet they are not nourished in the same manner as we are. Verily, then, it is a hateful and wicked dogma of the Anabaptists, who refuse baptism to infants because they lack perception and judgment and do not understand what is being done with them. It is from our point of view that they do not understand (what is taking place), from our point of view that they are thought to lack perception and understanding, but not thus from the view-
point of God, whose workmanship they are. For God, who nourishes them in a different manner than us, also has a different way of nourishing their hearts,” VI, 1321. The entire remark of Luther on Hosea 12:4 in this place deserves to be studied.
It is, indeed, impossible for us to describe and define infant faith, as we usually define the faith of adults by the three terms: knowledge, assent and confidence. In the Wittenberg Formula of Concord of 1536 there is found this statement: “When we say that infants believe, that is not to be understood in the sense that infants understand and perceive the movements of faith in them, but in this sense, that we reject the error of those who imagine that baptized infants are acceptable to God and are saved without any action of the Holy Ghost in them, for Christ clearly states that whosoever is not born again of water and the Spirit, etc. Hence the Holy Spirit must be efficacious and operate in infants who are being baptized in order that they can, in their own way, which is not sufficiently understood by us, nor explicable, accept the Kingdom of God, which is being offered and given in baptism,” Baier, III, 153. Chemnitz says: “In Mark 10 Christ affirms that adults must receive the Kingdom of God as little ones receive it. And in Matthew 18 he says: ‘Whosoever offendeth one of these little ones which believe in me’. And among the ’little ones’ He included a child such as He had placed in their midst. Besides, circumcision (which was applied to children) is called a ‘seal of righteousness’, Romans 4. Now if to circumcised children is ascribed righteousness, which is by faith, faith itself is ascribed to them. And there is no doubt that the Holy Spirit can effect faith in infants, who are not yet employing their reasoning faculty, though the mode and manner in which He does it cannot be comprehended and explained by us. The instance of John the Baptist plainly shows this. For it was to his exulting in his mother’s womb that the angel pointed when he said: ‘He shall be filled with the Holy Ghost from the womb’. True, an extraordinary instance like this does not establish a rule, still it proves that the Holy Ghost can work also in infants.” Luther has made very much of this instance in his Church Postil, Band XI, Seite 493f. [D. Martin Luthers vollständige Kirchen-Postill, oder Auslegung der Evangelien und Episteln auf alle Sonn-, Fest- und Apostel-Tage, Herausgeber Johann Georg Walch (Halle: Johann Justinus Gebauer, 1737)]. Gerhard tries to illustrate how there may be in an infant an “energeia” fidei, though we are not able to notice any manifestation of it. “A good tree in mid-winter is not destitute of the power to bear good fruit, although it does not show it externally, and shall we then deny infant faith on the ground that they do not exhibit the fruits of faith. As in seeds and in the roots of trees, though they may not be bearing fruit now, still the power to bear fruit when the proper time comes is there, so infant faith produces fruit in its season” etc. This illustration, however, must not be pushed beyond the point of comparison. It does not mean that infant faith is habitus otiosus, a sort of dormant faculty in them. It is really a live and active faith, as all faith must be. What Gerhard means to bring out is this: If we cannot notice infant faith, we have no right to deny its existence. The time when an infant to be baptized receives faith has also been discussed. All theologians of the Lutheran Church agree that infants at baptism have a faith of their own, and that such faith is necessary in order to receive the blessings of baptism. Some with Luther decline to decide the question, whether infants receive their faith before baptism, through the prayers of the Church and the parents or
sponsors – or in baptism. The safer view is the latter, viz., that infants receive faith in and through baptism, in the same manner as by the Word of the Gospel grace is offered to us and faith produced in us adults. Faith never precedes the divine offer of grace, but is a fruit excited in man by that offer. Luther says: “Also sagen wir auch hier, dass die Kindlein zur Taufe gebracht werden, wohl durch fremden Glauben und Werke, aber wenn sie dahin kommen sind und die Priester oder Taeufer mit ihnen handeln an Christus statt, so segnet er sie und gibt ihnen den Glauben und das Himmelreich,” Church Postil, Band XI, Seiten 486ff. [D. Martin Luthers vollständige Kirchen-Postill, oder Auslegung der Evangelien und Episteln auf alle Sonn-, Fest- und Apostel-Tage, Herausgeber Johann Georg Walch (Halle: Johann Justinus Gebauer, 1737)]; paragraphs 19-46, Leipzig Ausgabe, Band XIII, Seiten 360-361 [Des Theuren Mannes Gottes, D. Martin Luthers Sämtliche Theils von Ihm selbst Deutsch verfertigte, theils aus dessen Lateinischen ins Deutsche übersetzte Schriften und Werke (Leipzig: Johann Heinrich Zedler/Register: Leipzig, 1729-1733/1740)]. Again: “Darum sagen wir hier also und schliessen, dass die Kinder in der Taufe selbst glauben und eigenen Glauben haben, denselben Gott in ihnen wirkt durch das Fuerbitten und Herzutragen der Paten im Glauben der christlichen Kirche,” ibid. In our liturgical formula the infant is addressed, in its parents or sponsors, and is asked to renounce the devil and to profess his faith before the actual administration of the sacrament has taken place. All this is done for the sake of professing publicly our belief in the saving efficacy of the sacrament and the validity of the Covenant into which the baptized enter with God. The entire liturgy is a human product, and valuable only because it reveals certain biblical truths. We would have no difficulty with the baptismal question if we could condense the reading of the admonition, the prayers, the Scripture passages, the abrenuntiatio diaboli, the professio fidei and the application of the water all into one second. Since we cannot do this, we proceed by taking things after a certain order, the best that we have been able to devise. But we do not mean to teach that the infant has faith before grace has been offered to him, which can be done only through the actual administration of the sacramentum initiationis.
5. “Formale baptismi est verbum institutionis, seu quoad ablutio sit in nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti,” Baier. This is that feature of the sacramental action, which gives the action the signification of a true sacrament, and without it there would be no sacrament.
In Matthew 28:19 Christ says to his disciples: “Go ye, therefore.” Wherefore? Because He has plenary authority in heaven and on earth, as He had declared in the preceding verse. He, therefore, “can delegate power to whom He will,” and in the exercise of this power He now confers the following commission. He is addressing the 11 apostles, of whom only St. Matthew makes mention (verse 16); but as they personally could not execute the grand commission in all its extent and duration, he lays His command upon all “who, like them, will be believing disciples” in all ages. And now He tells in what manner they must baptize: “eis to onoma tou patros kai tou hyiou kai tou hagiou pneumatos.” Our English version “in the name,” which follows the Vulgate “in nomine” does not give the right force to the expression. The phrase does not merely mean invoking the name, under the sanction of this great name, but something more than this. It signifies into the power and influence of the Holy Trinity, into faith in the three Persons of
God, and the duties and privileges consequent on that faith, into the family of God and obedience to its Head. This “into” shows the end and aim of the consecration of baptism. The “name” of God is that by which He is known to us – that which connotes His being and His attributes, that by which there exists a conscious connection between God and ourselves (confer 28:20). So being baptized into the name of God implies being placed in subjection to and communion with God Himself, admitted into covenant with Him. It is to be observed that the term is “name,” not “names,” thus denoting the unity of the Godhead in the Trinity of Persons. The Lord’s words have always been taken as the formula of baptism, and have in all ages been used in its administration. The three divine Persons were revealed at the baptism of Jesus (Matthew 3:16f.); they are invoked at every Christian baptism. It is true that we read, in the early Church, of persons being baptized “in the name of the Lord Jesus” and “in the name of the Lord,” Acts 8:16; 10:48; “but this expression assumes by no means that the names of the other Divine Persons were not used; it denotes that converts were admitted into the religion which Jesus instituted, in fact, were made Christians. The above formula has from primitive times been considered indispensable for the valid administration of this sacrament. (See Apost. Con. [Constitutiones Apostolorum] 41; Tertullian, de Baptismo, XIII; Justin Martyr, Apol. 8, 79. [Confer First Apology, Chapter 61: “Christian baptism”]) ‘From this sacred form of baptism’, says Bishop Pearson, ‘did the Church derive the rule of faith, requiring the profession of belief in the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, before they could be baptized into their name’ (‘On the Creed’, Art. 1),” A. Lukyn Williams in Pulpit Commentary.
Theophylact says: Unum nomen, una Deitas, quia in nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti baptizare, est auctoritate et virtute harum trium personarum baptizare, quare, cum sit una auctoritas et virtus adeoque una essenti Patris, Filii et Spiritus Sancti, ideo non in nominibus, sed nomine Patris, Filii et Spiritus Sancti baptizare iubentur (apostoli).” Gerhard, to whom Baier appeals in citing these words, says: We declare this to be the sense of the words of baptism: “I, a minister of the Word, baptize thee, not in my name, nor by my own daring and authority, but upon the mandate, authority, instruction, institution and ordaining, and therefore, in the name and place of Christ, the High-priest of the Church, one only Mediator and Savior; that is, I pour upon thee water, that has been sanctified in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, that is, upon the command and with the invocation of the true God, who is one in essence and triune in persons, namely, Father, Son and Holy Ghost. Him I pray to receive thee into His grace, to forgive thee thy sins and to bestow upon thee everlasting salvation; and I verily testify that thou art being received into grace by God the Father, that thou art being washed from thy sins by the blood of the Son, the Mediator, and that thou art being sealed unto eternal life by the Holy Spirit, who regenerates and renovates thee. Know also that thou art being baptized ‘eis onoma’, into the name of that one true God, that is, that thou art being placed under obligations, to know, invoke and worship Him,” etc. Gerhard then cites, to prove the force of the phrase “in the name of,” as he has given it, the following passages, Exodus 5:23; Deuteronomy 18:7; 1st Samuel 17:45; 2nd Samuel 6:16; 18:20; Mark 9:39; John 15:32, and concludes: “Ex his et similibus locis apparet, in nomine Dei aliquid loqui vel agere idem esse, quod mandato Dei, loco Dei, in vera invocatione Dei,
virtute Dei, in vera erga Deum fiducia, ad gloriam Dei etc., alliquid loqui vera agere.”
The different formulas of baptism used in the Latin and Greek Churches have caused our theologians to inquire whether the text Matthew 28:19 is really meant as a formula of baptism. In the Latin church the priest says, as in ours, “I baptize thee,” etc., in the Greek, “Let this servant of the Lord be baptized,” etc. Brenz holds that no one should be permitted wantonly and from sheer caprice to change the words: “I baptize thee,” etc., but on the other hand, people must not connect some superstitious notion with just these words, as if they were a magical formula. “Non enim instituit Christus magiam, quae ad certam verborum formam et ritus alligata est, sed instituit coelestia sacramenta, quae constat sua ipsius sententia et voluntate, his vel illis verbis nobis significata.” Brenz, accordingly, holds that if the minister, after the candidate for baptism has recited the Apostles’ Creed, would perform the baptism with these words: “I have now heard from thee thy profession of faith, viz., that thou believest in God the Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, and in His only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ, and in the Holy Ghost, accordingly upon this thy profession and faith I baptize thee and sprinkle thee with water, in order that thou mayest be assured that thou hast been grafted into Christ, and the communion of all His blessings. Go in peace” – “hic certe baptismus esset verus baptismus, quia continet ea, quae baptismum necessaria sunt, et recitata est sententia verborum Christi, et si sonus ipse verborum paululum immutatus videtur.” Luther holds to the accepted formula “I baptize thee,” etc., because it assures the party baptized that he has received baptism not from a mere man, but from a vicarius Dei. But he adds: “Quocunque modo tradatur baptismus, modo non in nomine hominis, sed in nomine Dei tradatur, vere salvum facit.” Our theologians have therefore declared that if baptism had been performed with this formula: “I baptize thee in the name of the Trinity,” or if instead of “into the name,” the phrase “in the name” had been used, a proper baptism had been administered. Gerhard relates that about the year 745 a presbyter in Bavaria, who was ignorant of Latin had baptized “in nomine Patri, Filia et Spiritua Sancta.” The baptism was first declared null and void by his superior, but the case being referred to Pope Zachary, the following opinion was rendered: “Ille, qui baptizavit, non errorem introducens aut haeresin, sed pro sola ignorantiae romanae locutionis infringendo linguam hoc baptizans dixisset, non possumus consentire ut demo baptizetur.”
The Baptism administered in Free Protestant and Unitarian Churches in our country has compelled us to take a strong stand on the question of the proper baptismal formula, by rejecting baptisms performed by parties representing these bodies, because they deny the fundamental doctrine of the Trinity. This rejection would have to stand, if Unitarian or Free Protestant baptism had, by a certain deference and accommodation to a prevailing custom, been performed with the Christian, i.e., trinitarian formula. For the correct words would be manifestly used for purposes of deception, and without their intended divine meaning, yea, in contradiction of the same.
In the Roman Church the following Law is set up, according to the Catechismus Romanus, pagina 308: “Aqua, qua ad baptismum utimur, prius paranda et addito mystici benedictionis oleo consecranda est, idque non nisi in vigiliis paschae et pentecostis fieri debet.” Hoefling reports that
Gelasius taught: “Die Weihung des Wassers (welche ausdruecklich mit der zu — geschehen Verwandlung des Wassers in Wein verglichen wird) befruchte die ganze Substanz des Wassers mit der Kraft der Wiedergeburt, macht es wirksam, die Seelen zu reinigen.” Also the Lutheran dogmatician Fecht taught that baptismal water must be consecrated by the repetition of the words of institution in Matthew 28:19, 20, just as the bread and wine in the Lord’s Supper are consecrated by repeating the words of institution. Fecht went so far that he demanded that even if the infant seemed in imminent danger of death, yea, if it should actually die during the delay, the consecration of the water dare not be omitted. This consecration of the baptismal water is unauthorized by the Word of God and unsupported by the example of the orthodox Christian Church.
6. The Triune God “is Himself present with the water connected with the sacramental word,” viz., the word of institution just noted. The baptism of Jesus recorded by all the Evangelists was accompanied by a revelation of the Trinity. That baptism was a vicarious action, which our Savior and Surety undertook to fulfill all righteousness. He is the Head, we the members; what was vouchsafed to Him in visible glory, so that even John the Baptist saw and heard it, is vouchsafed invisibly to every disciple of His, at the latter’s baptism. The baptismal command to baptize into the name of the Trinity would be meaningless, if it were not to convey the idea of the presence of the triune God at each baptism, performed in accordance with this command. On the words of Jesus to Nicodemus, that the new birth must be “ex hydatos kai pneumatos,” Meyer remarks: “Water, inasmuch as the man is baptized therewith (1st John 5:7, 8; Ephesians 5:26) for the forgiveness of sins (Acts 2:33; 22:16; 1st Corinthians 6:11) and spirit, inasmuch as the Holy Ghost is given to the person baptized in order to effect his spiritual renewal and sanctification; both together, the former as causa medians, the latter as causa efficiens, constitute the objective and accusative element, out of which (compare 1:13) the birth from above is to be produced. The connection of the two words is so close, and each, moreover, is used without the article, that we are justified in rendering by a compound term ‘water-spirit’. Christian baptism is a baptism not with water alone, nor with the Spirit alone, but with water and the Spirit, both forming together the divinely ordained sacramental element for baptism. In 1st John 5:6 Jesus is described thus: ‘houtos estin ho elthoon di’ hydatos kai haimatos’, this is He that cometh by water, i.e., He came to His people, into His ministry, by some act at which water was employed. He entered His Messiahship by a water-sign, using that as a signal that His Kingdom was now at hand. The important point here is that Jesus Himself connects with the water of Christian baptism Himself, that the Lord Himself is connected with the water of baptism which He preached and ordained as a standing institution in His Church. And Ephesians 5:26 represents Him as the Sanctifier and Cleanser in baptism, and that because the washing of water in baptism is ‘by the word’, i.e., by His word of command and promise. Through the word, the Father, Son and Holy Ghost choose to be present in and with the application of water to a person.”
The question as to what becomes of infants who, without fault of their own, die unbaptized, has led to a discussion of the necessity of baptism. The Augsburg Confession in Article 9 says: “Of baptism, they teach, that it is
necessary to salvation.” Carpzov, in his Introduction to the Symbolical Books of the Lutheran Church, adds these words: “It is necessary 1) not absolutely, but 2) by a necessitas praecepti, because Christ thus proposes, ordinarily to save a person; and 3) by a necessitas medii, because it pleased Him to employ this means in applying the salvation which He has merited.” Kromayer remarks: “We proceed on the middle way, avoiding on the one hand the Scylla of Calvinism, which denies the necessitas medii, and on the other hand the Charybdis of Papism, which falsely asserts an absolute necessity of baptism, and hence, we assert indeed on the basis of John 3:5, 6 the highest necessitas praecepti as well as medii, however, not an absolute one.” This is on a line with the well-known saying of Augustine: “Contemtus sacramenti damnat, non privat.”
In answering the question, What becomes of unbaptized children, our theologians draw a distinction between infants of believers and of unbelievers. Regarding the former they believe that they are regenerated and saved by an extraordinary grace of God, while they pass no judgment on the latter, but commit them to God. Baier, quoting Gerhard, writes: “For children born within the Church, we entertain better hopes…. We cannot, nor must we rashly consign those children who perish either in their mother’s womb or through some sudden casualty, before they can obtain baptism; yea, we rather state, that the prayers of their God-fearing parents, or, if the parents have been neglectful in this respect, the prayer which the Church offers to God in behalf of infants, are graciously heard and these infants are received into grace and life.” Baier records the fact, however, that Gerhard has not touched on the exact mode which God employs in bestowing extraordinary grace. Speaking of Mark 16:16, Luther says: “Christ is content with having stated in the first part of this passage: ‘He that believeth and is baptized’, and in the second part: ‘He that believeth not’ without repeating the remark ‘and is baptized’. Of course, He has done this because He has sufficiently indicated in the first part, and has elsewhere issued more extensive commands as to what is necessary, e.g., in Matthew 28:19: ‘Teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of,’, etc. Now it does not follow (from His language in the second part of this text in Mark) that we may omit baptism, or that it is sufficient if a person claims to have faith, to be in no need of baptism. For any person who becomes a Christian and believes, will certainly be glad to accept also this symbol, in order that he may have both the divine testimony and the seal of his salvation and may derive strength and comfort from them throughout his life, also in order that he may publicly profess these things before the whole world. For in a Christian both these things must be found, according to the testimony of Paul, Romans 10:10: ‘With the heart (before God and himself) man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth (before the world) confession is made unto salvation’. It may, however, happen that a person may be a believer, though he has not been baptized, and again, there may be people who receive baptism without being believers. Hence this text must be understood so as to enjoin and sanction baptism as a thing that is to be used and not despised, as I stated; and yet it must not be explained so narrowly that any person who has not been able to obtain baptism stands condemned by it. And briefly, you can gather from this text these four propositions: 1) there are some who believe and are baptized; this is in accord with the general command and rule of Christ, which we must teach and keep; 2) there are some who believe and are not baptized;
3) there are some who do not believe, and yet are baptized; 4) there are some who neither believe nor are baptized. These distinct classes the text itself suggests. The common consensus or opinion has ever been, that if a person dies a believer, though unbaptized, he would not be condemned, for a case like this might happen that a person is a believer, and though desiring baptism, he is overtaken by a sudden death, as happens occasionally in the case of infants before, during or after their birth. Now these infants had been previously offered and commended to Christ by faith and prayers of their parents or other people and in accordance with His promise: ‘Suffer the little children to come unto me’, etc. He no doubt receives them” [D. Martin Luthers vollständige Kirchen-Postill, oder Auslegung der Evangelien und Episteln auf alle Sonn-, Fest- und Apostel-Tage, Herausgeber Johann Georg Walch, (Halle: Johann Justinus Gebauer, 1737)], Band XI, Seiten 1332ff. Dannhauer says: “How great the necessity of baptism is, our Savior Himself shows by His clear statement: ‘Except a man is born again of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the Kingdom of God’. The exceptive statement in this text we can change to the following declaratory statement: No unbaptized (children and) persons shall enter the Kingdom of heaven; unbaptized, mark you, in the privative sense (privative), i.e., any person who could and ought to have been baptized but despised the counsel of God regarding himself. For there are reasons which do not admit of this text being understood in the negative and unlimited sense (negative ac infinite) of any unbaptized whatsoever, viz., 1) the general purpose of the evangelical Scripture, which is comfort; 2) the particular purpose of this conversation with Nicodemus, which is to reprove the Pharisees for their contempt of the arrival of God in baptism. For he deals with a chief of the Pharisees, as if He wished to say: You, and these like you, despise the baptism of John; however, I tell you that no unbaptized despiser of baptism will enter the Kingdom of heaven. Accordingly Christ speaks of those who ought to, and could, but refused to be baptized….7) A multitude of objections could be raised (to the negative and unlimited understanding of the text) on the ground of the thief who was converted. He, no doubt, entered paradise unbaptized; for if he was baptized that must have occurred either before or during or after his crucifixion; it could not have been before, for no adult person was admitted to baptism without repentance; nor could it have been after, because he was dead; and it could not have been during his crucifixion, because what some have thought concerning the water which came out of the side of Christ, has been refuted even by Suarez, who says: ‘It is scarcely credible, that the water gushed forth with such force that it sprinkled the thief, especially since this thief occupied the place on the right hand of Christ, while the water flowed from His left side’. And the silly remark of Gretsen about the baptism of blood (the martyr baptism) is foreign to the text and blasphemous, for Augustine says: ‘That thief was not crucified for confessing Christ, but for his crimes; nor did he suffer for his faith, but came to believe during his suffering’. You may say with Augustine: In the thief there was not wanting a willingness to receive baptism, but he was necessarily in a position which prevented him from obtaining it.”
But does not the Augsburg Confession in Article 9 reject the teaching of the Anabaptists, that “children are saved without baptism”? Yes, the Anabaptist teaching is there rejected, and that is this, that as a regular thing and ordinary and proper way children are saved without baptism. But the
statement in the A. C. does not deny the possibility of an extraordinary mode of regeneration. It is one thing to say that without faith it is impossible to be saved, and another, without baptism it is impossible to be saved. The former is absolutely true, the latter, however, only when understood of the ordinary mode and manner which God has ordained not for Himself, but for men (Carpzov). The Roman Catholic Church teaches: “Semper ecclesia credidit, infantes perire, si absque baptismo de hac vita recedant,” Bellarmine. One section of Roman purgatory, the limbus infantum, is occupied just by these infants.
On the question whether the infants of pagans and unbelievers are consigned to the torments of hell, all our theologians, except Tarnovius have suspended judgment. To cite only one, Luther says: “In quo statu sint (non baptisati infantes) aut quid de iis fiat, commendamus divinae bonitati. Non habent fidem nec baptismum; num vero singulari modo eos recipiat Deus et dat fidem, non exstat in verbo, nec nos statuere audemus,” Erlangen, ex. opp. Lat. VI, 123. Carpzov shows that the charge frequently raised against the Augsburg Confession, that it teaches a damnation of all unbaptized children, is an unwarranted inference from the misunderstood rejection of the Anabaptist teaching noted above.
7. – 9. In these sections we have the finis cuius of baptism set forth. The finis cuius is the dogmatical term for the effects of baptism. If there are effects resulting baptism, there must be an efficacy in baptism, producing those effects. Accordingly, our textbook speaks at once of the efficacy and the effects of baptism. As to efficacy, it ascribes to baptism the twofold vis of a means of grace, viz., the vis collativa (“offers”) and the vis operativa seu effectiva (“operates”). As to effects, it names a) “the acceptance of divine grace,” which is nothing else than the creation of faith in the heart, and that again, is the same as regeneration; b) “perseverance in, or greater assurance of grace.” The reason for this distinction in the effects of baptism is because of the difference in the subjects to whom baptism may be applied. Baier states the finis cuius, or the effectus baptismi, thus: “proximus est regeneratio est renovatio baptizandorum; ultimus est salus aeterna eorundem.”
7. The passages in this section show that baptism is a medium efficax et causa consequendi finis” (Baier), in so far as it “offers the gifts of grace.” When Ananias summoned Saul to baptism, he offered to him the washing away of his sins, Acts 22:16. The same offer, together with the gift of the Holy Ghost, was made by Peter on Pentecost Day to the multitudes that heard him, Acts 2:38. Prior to Peter, John the Baptist had extended the same offer, Luke 3:3. Ephesians 5:26 shows that this had been the purpose of Christ with regard to His Church (“that he might,” etc.). Accordingly, whenever baptism is about to be bestowed, this purpose approaches realization. 1st Peter 3:21 states the ultimate effect of baptism (“save’) and the proximate one (“the answer of a good conscience toward God”), and these effects being produced by baptism, the offer of baptism is an offer of these effects.
All these passages containing summons to, or statements concerning the purpose of, baptism, would be meaningless, if in and with baptism the effects named were not produced ex parte Dei. So far as God is concerning, these texts declare what He is ready to do, when baptism is to be administered.
1st Peter 3:21 requires a little further exposition. The text opens with the relative pronoun “ho,” which refers back to “hydatos,” the water of the Flood. Literally rendered, the text would read: “Which (water of the Flood) as an antitype is saving you also, namely baptism.” This means “the water which is saving you, is an antitype of the water of the Flood,” Caffin in Pulpit Commentary. But did the water of the Flood save anyone; were not men destroyed by it? “That water was made the means of saving a few; it bore up the ark in which they were. It saved them, perhaps, from the malice of the ungodly; it saved them from the corruption, which was almost universal; it was the means of saving the race of men as by a new birth through death into a new life, a new beginning; it washed away the evil, those who suffered for evil doing. Thus the water of the Flood is the figure (‘typos’) of the antitype (‘antitypon’), baptism; the two, the water of the Flood and the water of baptism correspond as type and antitype. The apostle says, ‘Baptism is saving you’; he does not say, ‘has saved’; he is using the present tense in its proper sense of an incomplete action; it brings us into a state of salvation, into covenant with God. But it is only the beginning, the birth; the growth must follow; the death unto sin, the new birth unto righteousness, must be realized in actual life. Otherwise, alas! We shall have received the grace of God in vain. St. Peter hastens to explain his statements. Baptism doth save us, but not the mere outward ceremony; you may ‘make clean the outside’ with the most scrupulous care; you may be very careful in putting away the filth of the flesh (or, if the genitive is to be regarded as subjective, with Bengel, the flesh may put away its filth); but more is needed than the old Jewish washings, the frequent purifications.” There must be “the answer of a good conscience,” “alla syneidäseoos agathäs eperootäma eis theon.” “Eperootäma” is the German “Anspruch,” “claim.” The baptized have a claim on God, for their conscience has been purged from guilt, and they are ushered into a covenant with God, by their baptism.
8. There is in baptism also a vis operativa seu effectiva. The Galatians who were baptized have then and there “put on Christ,” and that is the reason they are now by faith the children of God, Galatians 3:26, 27. In Titus 3:5-7 the apostle traces such effects of grace as regeneration, justification, renewal and glorification, in a word, salvation, to “loutron,” “washing.” The genitives “palingenesias” and “anakainooseoos” which follow are genitives of quality. The water is called thus, because these events take place where it is applied; it is a regenerating and renewing washing. When this washing is applied the Holy Spirit is poured out on the baptized, and these people are called “dikaioothentes,” justified, namely through what just happened to them when they were baptized, and it is said “they have become (“genäthoomen”) “heirs to the hope of eternal life.” Thus they were saved “by” (“dia”), the washing, the washing being a medium efficax for all the effects here mentioned. According to Romans 6:3, 4, baptizing a person into Jesus Christ has the signification of merging him in the death and resurrection of Christ, i.e. making him personally share all the glorious effects of those acts. Hence “baptismus organon est non tantum offerens atque conferens gratiam iustificam respectu iustificationis, sed etiam medium operans respectu regenerationis et renovationis,” Carpzov.
9. The manner in which these effects are attained differs in infant children and adults. The faith, by which the merits of Christ are applied, is conferred on all children and
sealed to them in baptism. However, this is not done because of their birth from believing parents. “Federal grace” does not remove them from the curse of hereditary sin. In 1st Corinthians 7:14 we read: “The unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband; else were your children unclean, but now are they holy.” This text is frequently misunderstood. Luther is correct in stating that the apostle at this place speaks after the manner of the Hebrews and means the same thing as in Titus 1:15: “Unto the pure all things are pure,” and Romans 8:28: “All things work together for good to” the saints. He means to say: A Christian spouse need not separate from, but may abide with a non-christian spouse, and they may also beget and raise non-christian children. The reason is this: If the non-chrisitan spouse does not forbid his Christian partner to live as a Christian, the latter’s faith is such a mighty thing, that it suffers no harm by dwelling with a non-christian, and it makes no difference to him, whether the things and persons with whom he is occupied are holy or not…. Accordingly, also their children are holy, though they be not baptized, nor Christians. They are not holy as regards their persons, that is not the holiness of which Paul is speaking in this text; but they are holy to me: I can occupy myself with their education, and my holiness will not suffer by being engaged with work upon unholy persons. If a Christian wife has grown children from a non-christian husband – as frequently happened in the days of the apostles – and if she cannot induce her children to be baptized and to become Christians, she must not imagine that she must forsake her children on that account, or deny them her motherly care and attention. She must treat them as if they were the holiest of Christians; for they are not unclean but holy to her, i.e., her faith may exercise itself in love toward them and remain pure and holy, the dealing with unholy persons. 8, 1061. That the mere performance of the sacramental action is not to be regarded as sufficient, without faith, even in infants, has been previously shown. God works faith in infants by baptism as He works faith in adults by His Word. Also the preaching of the Gospel benefits nobody, unless it is received by faith, That faith no one can create for himself; the very Gospel, which he is asked to believe, induces him to do so.
Baptism in adults should be preceded by instruction. Besides the instance of the Ethiopian, Acts 8:35ff., we have those of the 3,000 baptized on the day of Pentecost, Acts 2:41, of the Samaritans whom Philip baptized after they had believed his preaching, Acts 8:12; of Lydia, Acts 16:44ff., of the Philippian jailer, Acts 16:31ff.; of Crispus, the ruler of the synagogue at Corinth, Acts 18:8. In these instances baptism is the seal of the covenant of grace into which the baptized have entered by faith and confirms their faith. Besides, as true believers practice daily repentance and faith, their baptism remains to them the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost unto the end of their lives.
In conclusion, I wish to say a few words on the question, whether Christian baptism was really a new ordinance, instituted by Christ. It is true that baptism was practiced among the Jews prior to the solemn inauguration of this ordinance by the risen Christ. The ceremonial washings of the Jews are classed with the transient forms of the Levitical worship, Hebrews 9:9, 10, which had not been intended to endure except “until the time of reformation.” They were removed when Christian baptism was erected into an abiding ordinance of the Church of God, Colossians 2:21-23. It is erroneous to say
that those ancient washings “developed” into Christian baptism. A shadow does not develop into a substance. Nor do we find the origin of Christian baptism in the baptism of proselytes, which seems to have been a Jewish church custom in the days of Christ. Though the rite of baptism was not unknown to the Jews, still the baptism of John startled them (John 1:25). Such passages as Isaiah 4:4 (1:16); Ezekiel 36:25; 37:23; Zechariah 13:1 had, no doubt, led them to expect a rite of purification in the days of the Messiah, which would supersede their Levitical purification. The delegation, which they sent to John was to determine the Messianic character of John and his preaching and baptizing. Johannic baptism has been a fruitful theme of debate. The question does not effect the personal faith of any Christian at the present time; for there is no person living who has received Johannic baptism (Chemnitz). The entire subject and certain features of it, as the incident recorded in Acts 19:1-7, will continue to be debated. It is best to fix in our mind a few essential facts, which will enable us to put the Scriptural estimate on the baptism of John. John had received a divine commission to preach and baptize, Luke 3:2; John 1:33; Matthew 21:25. He baptized with water, John 3:22. His baptism was honored with a wonderful manifestation of the holy Trinity, Matthew 3:16, 17, and by the Redeemer, in His capacity as the Representative of sinful mankind, the sin-bearing Lamb of God, accepting baptism at John’s hand, Matthew 3:13ff.; John 1:22ff. It was of the necessity of receiving John’s baptism that Christ spoke to Nicodemus, John 3:3ff. The Pharisees invited their eternal ruin by refusing John’s baptism, Luke 7:30. For John’s baptism was to shield them from the wrath of God, Matthew 3:7; it was for the remission of sins, Mark 1:4; it was a washing of regeneration, John 3:5. When Jesus began His public ministry, He took up the preaching and baptism of John, and His disciples practiced it with such success that John rejoiced, John 3:22, 25-36; 4:1, 2. All this evidence fairly compels the belief that there was no essential difference between the baptism of John and the baptism instituted by Christ ; that which the risen Christ did in Matthew 28:18-20 was merely to elevate a rite that had been previously adopted by an order “from above” to be a permanent institution of His Church and to proclaim its universal application. The contrast which John himself declares between his baptism and that of Christ is not a contrast between two baptisms with water. The baptism of Christ, which John foretells, is a baptism of the Holy Ghost and with fire, the Pentecostal baptism. But for the general purpose of begetting men unto a new life, sanctifying and saving them, the Spirit was also bestowed through John’s baptism, John 3:5.

§137. The Lord’s Supper.

The true doctrine of the Lord’s Supper must be taken chiefly from the words of institution. Only where this is done, there will be a reliable and perfect Scriptural argument. The Calvinists argue that the words of institution cannot be employed in an argument on this matter, because they are controverted, and their correct interpretation is still a matter of doubt. If this argument were admitted in this place, it would have to be admitted in every other place; and as a result of this we would have to discard every Scripture passage as useless in an argument, as soon as some one rises to controvert it. No doctrine of Scripture could be established from its locus
classicus, or sedes doctrinae, because it is just these passages of Scripture that are being attacked by false teachers.
We cannot admit the claim either that the words of institution can be used only in a secondary manner to establish the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper, namely, after the doctrine has been established from other Scripture passages. By this procedure we would obtain a doctrine, which had been construed out of certain passages which either do not treat of it at all or contain only remote references to it; and this doctrine, thus obtained, chiefly through the imaginations of the human mind, is to be verified ultimately by being measured against the words of institution. A doctrine thus gained would not be a Scriptural doctrine, and in presenting such a doctrine, Scripture would be used only to endorse what the mind of the theologian had invented.
We may, with Calov, express our surprise that any one should question the propriety of establishing the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper from its four sedes doctrinae, Matthew 26:25ff.; Mark 14:22ff.; Luke 22:19ff.; 1st Corinthians 11:23ff.; but that is exactly what the Calvinists have done and are doing still. The Calvinist Witaker refused to cite the words of institution in a debate, because he said those words were the “krinomenon,” i.e. the point in controversy. For the same reason Bullinger and the Zurich theologians refused to admit the arguments of the Lutheran Jac. Andreae. Lavater in his history of the sacrament claims that it is begging the question (petitio principii) to prove the real presence in the Lord’s Supper from the words of the institution. Others will admit the words of institution for use during a discussion on this sacrament, but only “deuteroos,” in a secondary manner and they refuse to consider the words of institution as the “principale fundamentum” of this doctrine. To this class belong all those Reformed teachers who treat the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper from John 6 which contains our Lord’s discourse in the synagogue at Capernaum concerning eating His flesh and drinking His blood. This discourse does not refer to the Lord’s Supper at all; for that was first instituted at a much later occasion. Other Reformed teachers prefer to treat the doctrine of the real and true humanity of Christ, of His ascension to heaven and His return to judgment as preliminaries to the doctrine of this sacrament. And when they thus have collected all manner of statements which do not treat of the Lord’s Supper at all, they come to the real sedes doctrinae. But they come fortified against those texts. The arguments which they have gathered from other texts of Scripture are used by them to destroy the forceful sayings of the sedes, and their whole labor upon these sedes is to twist and turn them until they will teach what the gentlemen were resolved before they must teach. Often these attempts are made after the method of the poet whose rule was: “Reim dich, oder ich friss dich.”
Since you will, no doubt, meet with Reformed Christians who will cite John 6 against the Lutheran Doctrine of the Lord’s Supper, you should have the reasons ready why this text cannot be used against us. 1) It is true, Christ speaks, metaphorically, of the eating of His flesh (not body), and of the drinking of His blood. But it was not until a year later that He solemnly instituted that rite of which He said: “Do this in remembrance of me.” We have no record that after His discourse in the synagogue at Capernaum the Lord’s Supper began to be celebrated by His disciples. And the record of the institution of the Lord’s Supper states plainly that it was “the same night in which he was betrayed.” Whatever, then, Christ meant in His
discourse at Capernaum, He did not mean this sacrament. The people who appeal to John 6 as the sedes doctrinae of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper must grant, in order to hold their own ground, that the Lord’s Supper was in existence before it was instituted. 2) When the three Evangelists and Paul present the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper, they speak of an eating and drinking of the body and blood of Christ, which may bring damnation, viz., to an unworthy communicant, 1st Corinthians 11:29. Such a possibility is not even remotely considered in John 6; on the contrary we are told in verses 54, 56 that the eating of His flesh and the drinking of His blood, of which the Lord speaks in this place, is always salutary, it is always to the end of obtaining eternal life. The people who appeal to John 6 as the sedes doctrinae for this sacrament, must grant, in order to hold their ground, that no person can commune unworthily. 3) In John 6 the Lord speaks of an eating and drinking that is absolutely necessary for salvation: “Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you,” verse 53. But of the eating and drinking in the Lord’s Supper Paul says, 1st Corinthians 11:25, “Let a man examine himself, and so let him eat.” Hence persons who are not capable of self-examination are not admitted to the Lord’s Supper. The people who appeal to John 6 as the sedes doctrinae for the Lord’s Supper are forced to believe, if they will be true to their own arguments, that all Christians who have not communed will be damned. 4) In John 6 our Lord speaks of His flesh and blood, but names no external element by means of which that is to be taken, while the elements are named and exhibited in the words of institution. The people who appeal to John 6 as the sedes doctrinae for the doctrine of this sacrament, must do one of two things: either they must eat the flesh of Christ and drink His blood without any external means, like the anthropophagi, or they must admit that the words “eating and drinking,” likewise the words “flesh and blood” in this text cannot be taken literally, but must be understood figuratively, for believing in the atoning sacrifice of Christ, and of the feasting on His merits with the mouth of faith.
In defending the Scriptural teaching of the Lord’s Supper, Luther had to reply to the Reformed who claimed that the true properties of the human nature of Christ proved that He could not be present in the Lord’s Supper. Luther showed that the Reformed failed to understand the person of Christ, for Christ did not entirely consist of a human nature, but there was a divine nature also, and that was united with the human, and the human and divine nature shared each other’s attributes and acted in common in all things. Upon this there went up a howl of indignation in the Reformed camp; why must Luther drag in the doctrine of the God-man, they said, to prove his teaching on the Lord’s Supper? This howl has not died yet; you can hear it in the Reformed literature of the 20th century. In replying to this argument you should tenderly remind the Reformed that it was their great man Zwingli, and their still greater men, Calvin, Beza, Bucer, who dragged in Christ into this controversy, and Luther had to reply to them, and show that the Christ, whom they had dragged in, was no Christ at all, because they had left out one very respectable portion of Him, viz., His divinity, and that, if Christ was to be discussed at all in connection with the Lord’s Supper, by all means, let the true, real Christ be brought forward. Moreover, Luther showed that Christ really does enter properly into any discussion of this sacrament and that in a twofold respect: 1) it must be established whether Christ really willed that His body and blood
should be present in the bread and wine; 2) that He is really able to cause His body and blood to be present in the bread and wine. Hence the voluntas and the potentia Christi lie at the very base of every correct teaching on this sacrament.
1. – 3. Our textbook first introduces the Scriptural terms by which this second sacrament of the N. T. is known.
1. “Trapedz kyriou,” in 1st Corinthians 10:21 is the first instance where this phrase is used as a name for this sacrament. “It refers to the whole sacrament,” says Meyer, “while ‘potärion kyriou’ names only one part.” The origin of this phrase is easily explained from the circumstances attending the celebration of this sacrament in the days of early Christianity. It was usually celebrated in connection with the common meals of the Christians, called “agapai”, or love-feasts, and these were taken at a table. There was no altar in the old sense of the term. Luther’s designation “sacramentum altaris” is without the Roman meaning; for there is no sacrifice offered in the Lord’s Supper, hence, no altar in the true sense of the word. Luther’s “altar” means no more than table.
2. “Kyriakon deipnon” in 1st Corinthians 11:20 signifies “a meal belonging to the Lord, consecrated to Christ” (Meyer). From Tertullian (Apologeticus pro Christianis, 30) we learn that the entire common meal, or love feast, of the early Christians was called “deipnon.” During this meal the bread was distributed, and after the meal the wine. Chrysostom, however, held that the Lord’s Supper came first, and afterward the love feast. This may have come into vogue at a later date, and rest on the ascetic idea that it was unbecoming to take the Lord’s Supper after other food. At any rate, Hofmann is right (against Meyer) in understanding “kyriakon deipnon” only of the celebration of the Lord’s Supper, for that is what the context suggests. The term “deipnon” suggests the evening as the time for the celebration, in commemoration of the night of the institution. Artificially and symbolically this night is produced at our present celebrations by the lighted candles on the altar.
3. The name Eucharist for this sacrament is derived from the verb “eulogäsas” in Matthew 26:26, and from the phrase “to potärion täs eulogias ho eulogoumen in 1st Corinthians 10:16. “Eulogia” and “eucharistia,” “eulogeoo” and “eucharisteoo” are synonyms and mean a “spoken blessing,” and “to repeat a blessing.” They refer to the act of consecration by which the earthly elements in this sacrament were set aside from common and dedicated to sacred use.
One name for this sacrament, which is probably the most common in our day, our text-book does not name – “communion.” This name, too, rests on Scripture; for [in] 1st Corinthians 10:16 Paul says that the cup of blessing which we bless is the “communion” (“koinoonia”) of the blood, the bread which we break, “communion” (“koinoonia”) of the body of Christ. This term “communion” is very rich in content. It signifies chiefly, if not exclusively in the apostle’s mind, that communion which is effected between the body of Christ and the bread, between the blood of Christ and the wine, when the sacrament is being celebrated. But we may extend its meaning also to that communion, or union, which holds that all communicants together in a common faith, which they profess jointly by their very act of communing together, and which binds them all to one Savior and Lord, and to that union in which love, brotherly love and active Christian fellowship, unites them with one another.
4. – 11. In this section our text-book describes the entire sacramental action of the Eucharist. It gives us first the summum genus of the definition in 4), next, the visible elements in 6), then, the invisible elements in 10), then the three essential acts of consecrating 5), distributing 7), receiving 9), then, the sacramental union 11) and the participants, 8).
4. Sacraments are acts. Neither the physical matter in a sacrament alone, nor the divine words alone, spoken in connection with the earthly element, nor these two together, but the action directed toward the earthly elements in accordance with the divine words and the repetition of the words, all these together are the sacrament. “Actio circa symbola extrema, iuxta praescriptum eius administrata, habet rationem et [virtutem] sacramenti,” Baier. This is shown by the procedure of our Lord at the first celebration or institution of the Lord’s Supper, Matthew 26:26-28. He “took bread, blessed it, gave it, said: Take, eat; He took the cup, gave thanks, gave it, saying: Drink ye.” And all these acts are made obligatory for every subsequent celebration by the command in 1st Corinthians 11:24, 25: “This do ye.”
If any of these acts is not performed, though the elements may be present, and though the word may have been spoken over them, there is no sacrament. If a communion should be interrupted, say, by the cry of Fire! after the consecration and before the distribution, and the communicants should disperse, there would be no sacrament. Nor can any other action be substituted for those named in the institution. Locking the consecrated wafer up in a pyx, and offering it for worship, are no sacramental acts. They cannot be justified from the word of the institution, and we shall see later that they cannot be justified on other grounds.
6. – 10. We note in the next place the materia of the sacrament, “Materia coenae duplex est, terrena et coelestis,” Baier. This is the ancient view of Christianity. Irenaeus (Adversus haereses, liber IV, capitulum 34) says “Earthly bread, receiving the benediction of God, is no longer common bread, but the Eucharist, and consists of two substances, the earthly and the heavenly.”
6. The materia terrena of the sacrament is a) bread, “panis verus.” Our Lord used unleavened bread at the first celebration, Mathew 26:26; for such was the passover-bread of the Jews; what kind of bread was used at Corinth and elsewhere we do not know. It is not likely, that unleavened bread was always used. Opportunities for obtaining such bread must have been extremely rare, even among Jews, except during the Passover week, and they must have been still more rare in the localities where the Christian Church had been gathered from heathens, as was the case in the European Churches. As a matter of fact, the Greek Church of today uses leavened bread, and has always used it from very ancient times. The Greek Church has made it a law to use only leavened bread, claiming that the Bread used by our Lord was “andzyma” not “adzyma.” Also in the Reformed Church some theologians have taught that the bread must be fermented bread. In the Latin Church leavened bread was used until the time of Pope Alexander I; since then the Jesuits have made the use of unleavened bread obligatory. As to the form of the bread, that used by our Lord came in large flat cakes, and was specially baked for the festival. We have no record of such bread being used at Corinth in the days of the apostle, or elsewhere in the early church. The words of institution contain no command concerning this point. Wafers have been introduced for
reasons of convenience at very early times, and since they are baked from flour and water, they contain the essential ingredients of the prescribed sacramental element. That the form of the bread must be large, so as to admit of being broken, cannot be established from the Lord’s words of institution. He, indeed, had large cakes before Him and broke them. We should probably do the same now, at least we would feel no hesitancy in doing this, ceteris paribus; but the Reformed Churches attach their entire false doctrine to this feature of breaking the bread, because to them the whole sacrament has merely symbolical meaning. Whether the bread must be baked by a special process or in the common way, whether wheat, rye, barley or oats must be used in its composition, all these things are left undefined in the words of institution. The Church of all ages has consulted its own convenience in these matters. But no substance that is not bread, e.g., cheese or dried fish can be substituted. Beza, among the Reformed, taught that in regions where bread cannot be had, other substances might be used.
b) The other materia terrena is wine. In connection with the institution our Lord used the phrase “gennäma täs ampelou,” “fruit of the vine,” which signifies any product from grapes of the vine. The phrase is broad enough to embrace fermented and unfermented wine. There is every reason to believe that the wine used by our Lord was fermented. New wine, or must, that can be obtained for a short time unfermented at the wine press, there could be none at that time, for the Passover was celebrated in early Spring. That the wine used by the Jews at their Passover meals was, and is, to this day, fermented wine, every Jewish Rabbi and every Bible Dictionary will tell you. That the wine used at Corinth was fermented is shown from 1st Corinthians 11:20, 21. Whether the wine which the Lord used was white or red, we do not know; whether it was diluted with water we do not know either. Christians living in localities where the wines are very heavy and fiery have experienced no scruples in mixing their communion wine with water. It is questionable, however, whether the product of modern times known as grape juice can pass as wine, hence as a proper sacramental element.
Gutachten der Fakultät ueber “Abendmahlswein.” “Es ist ihnen wie uns bewusst, dass ueberall in der ganzen lutherischen Kirche der Gebrauch des ausgegorenen Weines keinen Zweifel darueber aufkommen laesst, dass man damit das hl. [heiliges] Abendmahle recht und giltig feiert, wenn es sonst ueberhaupt nach der Einsetzung Christi verwaltet wird. Dagegen wird von nicht wenigen der Gebrauch des unausgegorenen Weines beanstandet, und viele Empfaenger, wohl auch der Spender des Sakraments wuerden ihn als Element nur mit zweifelndem Gewissen gebrauchen koennen. Unter solchen Umstaenden waere es unrecht, das Ungewisse fuer das Gewisse zu nehman und von der allgemeinen Praxis der lutherischen Kirche zu sicherem Aergernis vieler abzuweichen, zumal man ueberall ausgegorenen Wein haben oder beschaffen kann.”
The materia terrena remains throughout the entire sacramental action, from the consecration to the reception, in other words, there is never a moment during the sacramental action, when bread and wine are not bread and wine. In 1st Corinthians 11:26, 27 the apostle speaks to communicants about the consecrated elements, and still calls them bread and wine. This shows that the earthly elements do not change their qualities by consecration. In 1st Corinthians 10:16 the apostle calls the blessed, i.e., the consecrated bread the communion
(“koinoonia”) of the body of Christ. This text establishes the doctrine of the sacramental union of the elements. This union requires the presence of both elements in that union. A thing cannot be united with another thing, if it does not exist at all. “Koinoonia est inter duo unita existentia. Sublata existentia, fallitur relatio communionis,” Quenstedt.
It is necessary to maintain over and against the Roman Church, that the materia terrena in the Lord’s Supper is present along side of, and together with, the materia coelestis; and hence, there can be no transubstantiation of the earthly elements into the body and blood of Christ. It is a poor argument, to say: This is my body, is what Christ says, and therefore the substance of the bread has been converted into the substance of the body of Christ. For in the same way we might argue: Peter says to Christ: Thou art the Son of the living God; therefore the substance of the Son of man has been turned into the substance of the Son of God. In both statements two things, or substances, or natures are named. The person of Christ consists of two natures, the human and the divine, which are united in a personal union. Hence it can be truly said: Christ is the Son of God. Likewise, in the statement: This is my body, there are two substances named: one the earthly, bread; the other, the heavenly, the body of Christ; and these are sacramentally united. It is not necessary at all, to resort to the transubstantiation theory of the Papists in order to understand and explain this statement. For the bread is bread and remains bread; the body of Christ is the body of Christ and remains the body of Christ, without any change or transubstantiation. However, owing to that sacramental union by which the bread and the body of Christ become a sacramental unit, which fact is expressed by the demonstrative pronoun “this,” therefore, we may plainly and truly say: “This is the body of Christ.” It is a very familiar mode of speech, not only in Scripture, but in all human languages, to name only one substance, usually the one that is not visible, when handing a person something that is two substances united or combined. I hand some one my purse and say: Here are fifty dollars; a wine merchant shows a customer several barrels and says: This is Rhine wine, this is red wine, etc.; or a servant brings in a tray and says: Here is water. This is the so-called locutio exhibitiva, in which the particular “this” always refers to the complex thing, which is being exhibited, in other words, to substances which are united in the complex thing (Hafenreffer). Accordingly, it is insipid talk and nonsense, when rationalists and fanatics in our day say: if you stick to the literal words of institution and their literal meaning, the Roman doctrine of transubstantiation is the only correct and tenable one. Just that doctrine is proved false and untenable not only by the literal acceptation of what Scripture says about this matter, but also by the law of speech in all languages. Orthodox teachers of antiquity, too, have spoken of a change in the sacramental elements, but they did not mean an essential, but an accidental change, or rather an elevation of the earthly elements from common to sacred use. The Papists have argued: If the eucharistic bread is not changed into the body of Christ, then the statement: The bread is the body of Christ, is false. However, that statement is true, and has been made by the ancient fathers and by Luther. We answer: That statement is not a biblical one, but only occurs in church-parlance, and is based, not on transubstantiation but on the sacramental union (Hollaz). The transubstantiation of the Papists is really not a transubstantiation, i.e., a change or metamorphosis of one
substance into another, but it is an annihilation. For according to their belief, no particle of the bread and wine remain after the consecration. In creation we behold something springing into existence, which did not exist before; in transformation, we behold something passing from one existence to another; in annihilation, we behold something passing out of existence. Incidentally we may note, that the Roman doctrine of transubstantiation is self-contradictory. If the body of Christ in the Eucharist is produced by the consecration of the priest from out of the bread, that body cannot by the body of Christ, which was conceived by the Holy Ghost and born of the Virgin Mary. And thus they must believe that Christ has two bodies, one produced from the body of His mother, the other produced out of dough. And when the so-called “blessed host” is raised for adoration in their churches, their worshippers ought to be taught to recite the Second Article of the Creed somewhat like this: I believe in Jesus Christ, My Lord, who was conceived in the wonderful fancy of the Holy Father at Rome, and magically produced by Father Murphy at yonder altar from baked dough of Ceresota flour and Mississippi River water. Our older dogmaticians pointed out to the Papists that their adoration of the host was not Christ-worship (“Christolatria”), but bread-worship (“artolatria”). The papistical doctrine of transubstantiation was fully developed by Petrus Lombardus (†1164); it was proclaimed as the doctrine of the church at the Lateran Council of 1215. This heretical teaching has introduced a host of abuses, such as the adoration of the Holy Host, the withdrawal of the cup from the lay communicants, the processions in the Roman Churches and on public festivals, especially on Corpus Christi (Fronleichnam).
10. The materia coelestis of the sacrament is “the true body and blood of Christ,” verum et substantiale corpus, verus idem quoad substantiam sanguis Christi.” This substance is called the heavenly element, not because this part of the sacrament remains in heaven, not because this is a sort of ethereal or sidereal substance, but because it is present in the Lord’s Supper in a supernatural, however, true and real manner, and is united with the earthly element.
As to the body of Christ, it is stated, that it is “that which is given for us,” “to hyper hymoon didomenon,” Luke 22:19; “to hyper hymoon,” 1st Corinthians 11:24. As to the blood of Christ, we are told that it is “that which was shed for us, for many, for the remission of sins,” “to peri polloon ekchynnomenon [Tischendorf] eis aphesin hamartioon,” Matthew 26:28; “to ekchynnomenon [T.],” Luke 22:20, “hyper hymoon”; “to ekchynomenon [Textus Receptus] hyper polloon,” Mark 14:24. These statements clearly point to the sacrificial offering, which Christ made with His body and blood for the atonement of our sin.
Body and blood are mentioned by our Lord as distinct parts of the materia coelestis, and each of them is conveyed by a distinct and separate act, the former in the distribution of the bread, the latter in that of the wine. In order to justify their withdrawal of the cup from lay communicants, the Papists teach that the entire Christ is the heavenly element, and that the entire Christ is received by the communicants either with the bread alone (communio sub una specie), or with the bread and the wine (communio sub utraque specie). This view necessitates that also the divinity of Christ be included in the heavenly element; for Christ certainly is not entire without His divinity. The words of institution name only the body and the
blood as the heavenly element. Everything else is mere speculation, designed to make the ignorant laymen believe they lose nothing, if they receive communion only in one kind.
To express the idea that the blood of Christ must be received also with the bread, because that is the body of Christ and the body cannot be without the blood, the Papists have coined the word “concomitant” (concomitantia, because the blood is said to accompany the body). Luther has exquisitely satirized this Romish concomitance. He says: “The finest piece in the Bishop’s (of Meissen) proclamation is that the parsons are to teach the laymen that in communion in one kind, there is present the entire Jesus Christ, the Son of God, God and man, also His body and blood, and is eaten and drunk by the lay communicants…. This view is established by concomitance (which means about the following): Since the body of Christ is not without blood, it follows, that His blood is not without His soul; from this it follows that His soul is not without divinity; from this it follows that His divinity is not without the Father and the Holy Ghost; from this it follows that in the sacrament, even when administered in one kind, there is the soul of Christ, and the Holy Trinity is eaten and drunk with the body and blood of Christ; from this it follows that in every mass the mass priest offers up twice and sells the Holy Trinity; now since the Deity is not without the creatures, it follows from the foregoing premises, that heaven and earth is also present in the sacrament; from this it follows that the devil and hell are also in the sacrament; from this it follows that any person receiving communion also in one kind, devours the Bishop of Meissen with his mandate and proclamation; from this it follows that every priest at Meissen in each mass eats and drinks his bishop twice; from this it follows that the Bishop of Misnia must have a larger body than heaven and earth. And who could enumerate what all does follow! But ultimately this also follows that also such drawers of inferences are asses, fools, blind, insane, mad, raving, etc.; this inference is certain,” XIX, 1388f.
11. The body and blood of Christ are present in the bread and wine. Our text-book cites first Matthew 18:20 to show that Christ is present in any assembly of His believers, which has met in accordance with His direction; hence also in an assembly of communicants. By reason of the personal union, the divine attribute of omnipresence or ubiquity is shared also by the human nature of Christ. And when Christ promises to be present with two or three believers, He promises that also His body shall be present, because it is united with His divine nature. The possibility of the body and blood of Christ being present everywhere should not be explained by saying that He is now in a glorified state and possesses a corpus glorificatum; for our vile bodies shall once be changed so as to be like His glorious body. We, too, will have a corpus glorificatum; still we do not claim that we will ever possess omnipresence. The body of Christ, however, is not only a corpus glorificatum, but also a corpus maiestaticum, because of its personal union with the Logos, and because of His sitting at the right hand of the Father. The possibility of His body being present in the Lord’s Supper must be established by pointing to His corpus maiestaticum. This passage in Matthew, cited here, is to show that the entire Christ can be, and is, present at communion. It is not meant to favor the view, which we rejected before, that the entire Christ is received in communion; the entire Christ is present in communion, but only His flesh and blood are sacramentally eaten. Bellarmine
casts ridicule on this Lutheran teaching by saying: “Ubiquity (i.e., the teaching that Christ is omnipresent) militates against the very sacrament of the Eucharist, for the establishment of which it was invented. For if the flesh of Christ is everywhere, we are in no need of the Eucharist” (i.e., of this special ordinance by which we are to receive Him). Dannhauer called his attention to the fallacy he was committing. In order to receive Christ, we must have a way made for us. That way has been made, but it is not through believing in His omnipresence, but by going to the sacrament, because we have His express command and His promise, that if we do that we shall receive Him. This whole question, whether it is possible for Christ to be present in the Eucharist, is really out of place, because we have His statement, that He actually is present. Why should anyone still wish to debate the possibility of a thing when he has been assured of its actuality? However, with Luther, we may a posteriori illustrate the possibility. He says: “Behold, the rays of the sun are so close to you, that you feel them stinging your eyes or your skin; yet you could not lay hold of them and lock them in a chest, even if you were to catch at them forever. You may prevent the rays from shining into your window; but you cannot touch and catch them. Thus Christ, though He is present everywhere, does not permit us to touch or catch Him; He can evade you in such a manner, that in reaching out to Him you get into your hand an empty shell from which the kernel is gone. Why? Because it is one thing to say, God is here, and another, He is here to me. He is present to you when He issues His word and allies Himself to that and says to you: Here you are to find me,” 20, 814.
The second passage, 1st Corinthians 10:16, refers to that particular presence of the body and blood of Christ in the Eucharist. In the strong form of a rhetorical question, which amounts to a strong affirmation, Paul calls the “cup of blessing,” “koinoonia tou haimatos,” and “the bread which we break,” “koinoonia tou soomatos tou christou.” Between the materia terrena and the materia coelestis there exists a union, in consequence of which “the body of Christ is verily and truly distributed with the bread, and His blood with the wine,” Baier. This union is called the sacramental union. It is not an unio substantialis, by which the bread and the body of Christ, on the one hand, and the wine and the blood of Christ on the other, would be formed into new substances, so that out of the union of the two earthly and the two heavenly elements, hence out of four distinct substances there would be formed two. Nor is the sacramental union an unio personalis, such as that which unites the human with the divine nature in the person of the God-man, for in that case the one element would have to assume the other. Nor is the sacramental union an unio “parastatikä” seu localis, which would mean that the body of Christ would be locally somewhere in or about the bread, and the blood somewhere in or about the cup. Nor is it, lastly, an unio mere significationis, i.e., such a union that bread and wine as emblems indicate ideally the body and blood of Christ which in reality are absent. The sacramental union is a union which admits of each element remaining what it is and yet entering into a union with the other, and that, a true and real union, so that communicants receive by one and the same act the united element. It is called a sacramental union, because it occurs only in this sacrament, and is without a parallel elsewhere. Beyond this it is impossible to describe or to define the sacramental union.
In the Lutheran Church the phrase is current “in, with and under the bread and wine the body and blood of Christ are distributed.” This phrase is not intended as a description of the mode and manner of the presence of the heavenly elements in the sacrament, but it is used 1) to express over and against the Reformed the praesentia realis, and 2) it is employed to counteract the Romish transubstantiation idea. The Reformed teach a presence of the body and blood of Christ in the sacrament, but theirs is a praesentia imaginaria: believing communicants namely, in the act of communing, think of the body and blood of Christ, and that they were redeemed by Christ offering them as a sacrifice for their sins; if they fail, however, to have these thoughts, the body and blood of Christ are not present.
Various false names have been coined for the Lutheran doctrine by its adversaries, such as consubstantiation, impanation, invination. These terms are given in many encyclopedias as expressions of the Lutheran teaching on the Eucharist. All of them are wrong. As to consubstantiation (consubstantiatio, “synousia”) the Calvinists claim that logically we must do and teach that. Kromayer answered them thus: “We proceed on the middle way, avoiding, on the one hand, the rock of “metousia,” i.e., the transubstantiation of the Papists; on the other hand the rock of “apousia,” i.e., the entire absence of the Calvinists; and we teach “parousian,” i.e., the presence of the body and blood of Christ with the symbols. As regards “synousia” we could admit that term, if it signified the sacramental union of two unlike substances which are thereby declared to be present at the same time in the sacrament. But since the Calvinists will have that term to signify the local inclusion of the body of Christ in the bread, the hiding-away of a small corpuscle under the bread, impanation, artocreas, i.e., eine Fleischpastete (meat sandwich), we rightly abstain from the use of that term.” But, say the Calvinists, do you Lutherans not say yourself that the body and blood of Christ are in the bread and wine, with the bread and wine, under the bread and wine? Kromayer shows first that this phrase does not mean to explain what is incomprehensible, viz., the modus praesentiae; next he shows that the phrase imitates the language of Scripture in regard to another mystery; for we read 2nd Corinthians 5:19: “God was in Christ,” and Acts 10:38: “God was with Christ.” As regards the preposition “under” [“unter” – “among”; “sub” – “within”] which Luther uses in the Small Catechism, that is not to signify that the body of Christ is somehow concealed below the bread, but to express the great mystery of the sacramental union. The same explanation applies to the words of the communion-hymn which Luther adopted from Huss: “Verborgen im Brod so klein.” Such phrases can indeed be given a wrong meaning by designing persons; hence Kromayer properly cites the old adage:

Sit bonus interpres, nunquam mala verba nocebunt;
Sit malus interpres, nunquam bona verba iuvabunt.

Gerhard has exhaustively shown what Lutherans do not mean, and what they do mean by the term sacramental union. They do not mean: impanation, nor consubstantiation, nor physical inclusion, nor local presence, nor the concealment of a diminutive body of Christ in the bread, nor the changing of the essence of bread into the body, nor that the body becomes permanently affixed to the bread, even when that is not being used for a sacramental purpose, nor a personal union between
the body of Christ and the bread. “But,” he says, “we believe, teach and confess, that according to the institution of Christ Himself, in a manner that is known to God alone while to us it is incomprehensible, there is verily, really and substantially present with the eucharistic bread, as the divinely ordained means, the body of Christ, so that by means of that bread we take and eat, in a sublime mystery, the true body of Christ.” Some Lutherans have followed Cyril and have called the presence of the body and blood of Christ in the sacrament a corporal presence. By this term they did not mean that the body and blood of Christ were present in a corporeal manner, but that the real body and blood were present. Hence in their view, the term “corporalis” refers to the objectum, not to the modus, of the presence.
Since the bread and wine in the Eucharist, owing to the institution of Christ, are sacramentally united with His body and blood, every communicant receives the body and blood of Christ, and it is impossible for any communicant not to receive them. The faith, or lack of faith of any communicant, does not affect the substance of the sacramental elements, but only himself. It is plain from 1st Corinthians 11:27, 29 that also unworthy communicants receive the body and blood of the Lord; for they become guilty of it, because they fail to distinguish between common food and that which is offered to them in the sacrament. By denying that unbelieving communicants receive the body and blood of Christ, a person reveals that he does not believe in the real presence of the body and blood of the Lord in communion. All the confessional writings of the Reformed deny this. This question, therefore, do unbelieving communicants receive the body of Christ? is the real test-question in determining the confessional standpoint of a person on the doctrine of the sacrament. If a person says “No” to this question, he is an errorist, though he may approach the teaching of orthodox Christianity on the sacrament in ever so many other parts. Luther said, and the Formula of Concord quotes his words: “I reckon all in one mass as Sacramentarians and fanatics, as they also are who will not believe that the bread in the Lord’s Supper is his true natural body, which the godless as Judas himself received with the mouth, as well as did St. Peter, and all (other) saints; he who will not believe this (I say) should let me alone, and not hope for any fellowship with me; there is no alternative (thus my opinion stands, which I am not going to change),” Jacobs, 607. By the way, the Reformed commit a huge self-deception when they deny that unbelieving communicants receive the body and blood of Christ. One would infer that they do hold that believing communicants do receive the body and blood of Christ. But in reality the Reformed hold that even believing communicants receive merely emblems of the body and blood.
The sacramental union of the bread and wine with the body and blood of Christ necessitates a sacramental eating and drinking of the united substances: manducatio exhibitio sacramentalis. “Sacramental eating and drinking embraces in one action (uno actu) both the natural and the palpable eating of the blessed bread, and the true, though not palpable and natural eating of the body of Christ, which is sacramentally united with the bread. Sacramental drinking embraces in one action the palpable and natural drinking of the blessed wine, and the true, though not palpable drinking of the blood of Christ, which is sacramentally united with the same,” Baier. And this sacramental eating and drinking is called oral, because the mouth is the organ for the entire act in both cases; only
while the bread and wine are orally received in a physical manner (manducatio et bibitio oralis physica) the body and blood of the Lord are orally received in a hyperphysical manner (manducatio et bibitio oralis hyperphysica). But also this latter eating and drinking is true eating and drinking. The distinguishing marks of the true teaching on sacramental eating and drinking are these: 1) there is only one organ for it, viz., the bodily mouth, not two organs, the mouth and faith; 2) there are two distinct substances received in one and the same action. Luther says: “Here we take our stand, that is what we believe and also teach, that the body of Christ is received and eaten in the Lord’s Supper truly and bodily. However, we do not know and we are not to know, how this is done, or in what manner Christ is in the bread. We are to believe the Word of God, and not fix mode or limit to what it tells us. The bread we see with our eyes; but we hear with our ears that the body is also present,” XX, 777.
All those who reject the sacramental union reject sacramental eating and drinking also. Some of the Reformed have uttered horrible blasphemies in this connection. Zwingli has called sacramental eating and drinking “pestis,” Beza, “figmentum et commentum, cuius vel ipsum satanam pudeat,” “brutum et cyclopicum esum.” He has called the Lutherans “sarcophagi” and “Capernaites,” imputing to them that they held the belief of the people of Capernaum, who so grossly insulted Christ and misinterpreted the sermon which He had preached to them, that they imagined they could eat His flesh and drink His blood like cannibals would. That Luther was the Capernaite you can readily prove any time by the following remark of his: “We say that the disciples murmured and objected both to the spiritual understanding (of His words, of which Christ had spoken) and to the bodily eating of His flesh; for they did not understand either aright, because they imagined that they must tear His flesh with their teeth, like common meat,” XX, 978.
Since the Scripture-proof for the real presence is contested in many ways, it is necessary that we examine this point more closely. Baier’s explanation excels by reason of its brevity and plainness. “The true and real presence, and the true and real eating and drinking of the body and blood of Christ, is proven chiefly from the very words of institution. Handing the disciples the bread, Christ says: Take, eat, this is my body; handing them the cup, which contained the wine, He said: Drink, this is my blood. Without question His words refer to oral eating and drinking, and hence, when taken in their native meaning and force, they signify most clearly, that what He bids them take and eat with their bodily mouth, and to the presence of which He, of course, testifies in His own body, and what He bids them drink, likewise with their mouth, from the blessed cup, is His own blood. For having handed them the bread with the words: Take, eat, Christ proceeds: This is my body. If these words are taken in their proper sense and not figuratively, this is their meaning: This which I give you, and bid you take and eat, is my body. Similarly, Christ having handed them the cup containing the wine, said the words: Take, drink, and adds: This is my blood. The sense again is: This, which I give you, and bid you take and drink, is my blood. Nothing but bread and wine, indeed, was exhibited to the senses of the disciples Still it was declared to them by the words, which the Lord added, that something else, which was not subject to sense perception in the same way as bread and wine, namely, the very body and blood of Christ, was nevertheless joined to
and united with what was exhibited to their senses, and hence was by these additional words of the Lord declared to be really present and verily exhibited.” The figurative meaning which has been eliminated from the words of institution is, moreover, declined 1) on the ground that the common rule and natural way of interpretation must not be abandoned, viz., that words must be taken in their natural meaning, unless there is an urgent necessity, which compels to resort to a figurative meaning. This rule must be observed with special care in statements which contain supernatural matters and are objects of faith. 2) Three evangelists and Paul, all of whom were removed from one another in time and place, have recorded the institution of the sacrament, but not one of them has indicated by a single word, that a figurative meaning of their words must be adopted, so that we would have to believe that not the body, but a symbol of the body is eaten, and not the blood, but a symbol of the blood is drunk. 3) The harmony of 1st Corinthians 11:27-29 with 10:16 requires that the words of institution be taken in their literal meaning; for in the former passage the unworthy communicant is said to be unworthy and guilty of the very body and blood of the Lord, which he has received unworthily and so as to heap reproach on the Lord; for the bread and wine, as is shown by the latter passage, are the “koinoonia,” the communication of the body and blood of Christ. “Koinoonia,” communion, however, cannot mean that there is here nothing more than a symbolizing of one thing by another, but a real union of the two. 4) The sacrament is our Lord’s last will and testament. In a document of that kind, there is required, above all, the use of the proper and clear terms. Now it is hardest of all, to think that Christ, the most wise and truthful, should either purposely or through imprudence, have furnished the materials for controversies and quarrels by the improper use of the terms of His will.
The Lutheran student should read in this connection two treatises of Luther: 1) “Dass diese Worte Christi: Das ist mein Leib, etc., noch fest stehen wider die Schwaermergeister,” April, 1527, XX, 762-892. 2) “Bekenntniss vom Abendmahl Christi,” March, 1528, XX, 894-1104. There is a valuable article of Dr. Walther on this matter in Band 4 of Der Lutheraner, inscribed: “Warum sind die Einsetzungsworte: Das ist mein Leib, usw., eigentlich zu nehmen?” Seiten 20-157.
The figurative meaning which the Reformed assume in the words of institution is thus disproven by Calov: “Not in a single word of the institution is there found a figure of speech…. For if with Carlstadt ‘touto’ is taken as ‘touto deiktikon’, signifying that Christ, when pronouncing this word, pointed at His own body, at Himself, as He was sitting at the table, Mark creates a difficulty, because he employs ‘touto’ also when speaking of the blood of Christ, and it was plainly impossible for Christ to point to His blood when pronouncing the second ‘touto’. Moreover, it would have been plainly an insipid speech, if Christ had said to the disciples: Eat; here you see my body sitting; drink; here is my blood, too, sitting among you. Again, if with Zwingli we locate the figure of speech in the copula ‘estin’, all the evangelists rise to protest; for they give us no indication of a symbolical meaning being contained in their statement, and besides, Luke omits the verb ‘estin’ entirely, making Zwingli’s view utterly inapplicable; for it is impossible to assume a figurative meaning in a term which is not there, much less to transfer a figurative meaning from an absent term to the rest of the statement. Lastly, if anyone were to give countenance to the view of Oecolampadius, who in plain
opposition to Zwingli locates the trope in the predicate noun ‘sooma’, which he understands to mean ‘symbol of the body’, or of Calvin, who takes ‘sooma’ in the sense of ‘the benefits of the body of Christ’, he would be called to order by Luke and Paul, who state that no other body but that is here given, which was delivered into death for us, thus compelling us to understand ‘sooma’, as even Beza grants, of the very substance of the body of Christ.” The Reformed charge the Lutherans with having themselves departed from the literal meaning or from the very words of the institution, because they have adopted the formula “in, with and under.” It has been shown before what meaning Lutherans do, and do not, connect with that formula. That formula vexes the Reformed so exceedingly that they have coined this Latin verse about it: “In, sub, sum fallunt totum monosyllaba mundum,” i.e., these monosyllables, “In, with and under” are deceiving the entire world. Gerhard tells them that the Lutherans have no desire to quarrel with anyone about words, if the Reformed would only concede two points: 1) that there is in the sacrament a real presence of the body and blood of Christ; 2) that the words of institution must be taken in their natural sense. Luther, too, says to his opponents: “We poor sinners are not so insane as to believe that the body of Christ is in the bread, in a gross and visible manner, as bread is in a basket and wine in a cup, as our Schwaermer would impute to us, in order to have their fun at our folly. No, we simply believe that the body of Christ is present as His words indicate: This is my body, etc. The fathers have occasionally used such expressions as this: The body of Christ is in the bread; but that was done with the single intention of stating that the body is present. We would not object to such expressions: The body is in the bread, the body is the bread, the body is where the bread is, or any other expressions that one might choose. We are not going to quarrel about words, if only this meaning is allowed to stand, that the bread which we eat in the Lord’s Supper is not simple bread, but the body of Christ,” XX, 811.
The Reformed have sought to disprove the real presence by the fact that Christ has ascended to heaven and now sits at the right hand of the Father. Chemnitz replies to this argument, as follows: “True, Christ ascended to heaven, visibly and locally, in His body, and in accordance with the true and natural manner, and the properties of a body, just as He will also return in the same manner for judgment. However, that He did not know and could not employ another, namely a heavenly and supernatural manner, by which He could be present in the sacrament with His body and blood in accordance with the words of institution, these articles of the ascension and His sitting at the right hand of the Father do not show, but they teach and establish the very opposite. For these articles of our faith testify that Christ ascended bodily to heaven, not like the birds rise from the ground and perch in the top of a tree, nor like Elias who was caught up into heaven, but in such a manner that He would sit down at the right hand of the Father Almighty. The right hand of God, however, is not a circumscribed place or a particular seat or region in heaven, where Christ is kept shut in, but Scripture calls the right hand of God the majesty and power of God, which fills all things. To this majesty Christ was exalted according to His human nature, ‘above every principality, power, dominion and every name which might be named, not only in this world, but also in the world to come’…. Hence all things are subject to Him, also according to His human nature…. Could He then not make good with His body and blood, what He has said and ordained in the
sacrament with the express and clear words? Yea, these very articles (which are cited against us) help to prove the true and essential presence of the body and blood of Christ in the sacrament, and in accordance with the words of institution. For though such a presence is impossible according to the natural mode and properties of a body, still would it not be a horrible blasphemy to say or think that He who ascended to heaven and sits at the right hand of the Father could use no other way? Hence if you reflect on the objection which has been raised, you will perceive out of what kind of cloth the faction of the Sacramentarians has been cut.”
In His discourse at Capernaum, Christ had told the Jews that with the carnal mind they could never grasp His words, and He had said: “The flesh profiteth nothing,” John 6:63. Oecolampadius took up this remark and claimed that this remark placed an insurmountable wall around his position. He connected this meaning with it: “Christ’s flesh profiteth nothing,” hence it is useless to teach that His body and blood are present in the sacrament. Luther knocked this great wall over with the remark: he asked Oecolampadius who had given him the right to insert the “my” before “flesh.” The whole context in John 6 shows that Christ with that remark refers to the gross, carnal conception of the Jews.
We proceed now to the study of the three essential acts in this sacrament: consecration (5.), distribution (7.), reception (9.).
5. Baier calls consecration the causa impulsiva minus principalis of the sacrament. The idea is this: The love of Christ, in particular, the Savior’s love, moved Him to give His people this sacrament. This love is the causa impulsiva interna; it is indicated in the very nature of the institution, both in what He gives (His body and blood) and in the purpose for which He gives it (remission of sins), and besides, this love is mentioned in John 13 as a feature that came out strongly in the Savior’s action in the night of the institution. The causa inpulsiva externa of the sacrament is the merit of Christ’s passion and death. These causes connect not only with the first celebration of the sacrament, but with every subsequent one. But as regards His real presence at every administration of the sacrament, the causa impulsiva for that must be sought in the very institution of the sacrament. That act of instituting for all times this sacramental feast is the principle moving cause for His presence in every subsequent celebration. Since this presence is invoked in the words of consecration, the act of consecration, itself, is called a causa impulsiva, namely, minus principalis of the real presence. This, however, is not to be understood in this sense that the recital of the words of consecration by the minister moves the will of Christ by their own force, or by some magical virtue, to be present. For the presence of Christ rests on the strength of His own institution of this sacrament. The Formula of Concord says: “Since also concerning the consecration and the common rule…. has united His command and act with our declaration,” p. 614f.
Since the celebration of the Lord’s Supper is a part of the public worship, the administration of it belongs ordinarily to the called ministers of the Church. On the question of the admissibility of a layman administering the sacrament, our dogmaticians, as a rule, urge the following reasons against it: 1) there is no such necessity of a person communing, as of a person receiving baptism. Hence while we do not hesitate to encourage lay baptism in an emergency, we do not feel the same urgency in the case of lay administration of communion.
Communion presupposes faith, and a believer who cannot obtain communion from his minister can still eat and drink the flesh and blood of Christ spiritually by faith. 2) A person having received communion from a layman might do so with doubt in his heart as to the validity of the administration, or might afterwards be visited with such doubt, and that would deprive him of the very blessing which he sought in communion, according to the statement of Paul: “Whatsoever is not of faith is sin.” However, on Scriptural grounds no valid reason can be advanced against laymen administering communion when called upon to do so, in an emergency; for all the rights and privileges of the church are vested in the entire congregation, and are personally held by every believing member.
The administrant of communion is also the consecrator. Consecration is performed by prayer addressed to God. By means of the act of consecration the earthly elements are withdrawn from common use. Hence the act of consecration is also called the benediction or blessing (benedictio sive gratiarum actio). In our church this is usually done by reciting the Lord’s Prayer, and then, repeating the words which Christ uttered at the institution of the sacrament. These words are, indeed, the omnipotent words of God, but it is not by their own internal and physical force that they effect the sacramental union. They are rather addressed to Christ as a prayer, in accordance with His command and promise, “This do ye,” and thus move Him to connect His body and blood with the bread and wine whenever this shall be distributed. For the sacramental union does not occur aside from, or independently of, the distribution and reception of the consecrated elements.
We are not told in the divine records of the institution, just what words the Lord used when He blessed the bread and wine, nor do we find anywhere in Scripture a prescribed formula of consecration. Accordingly, in the early Christian Church the mode of consecration was regarded as an adiaphoron. But from the literary documents reaming from that period we learn that the Lord’s Prayer alone was used at first; afterwards the words of institution and also the liturgical embellishments were added, usually such as were of the nature of a confession of the truths underlying the sacrament. Luther says: “I know, indeed, that all Christians are under obligation, because of the institution and command of Christ, to recite these words in the Lord’s Supper, and I do not believe that even the enthusiasts would be so bold as to omit it with a good conscience,” XX, 916. Luther, in this passage, insists that the words of the institution must be used “in the sacrament,” but he does not say just at what point, i.e., whether in the consecration or in the distribution.
7. – 9. As regards distribution and reception we have to note a contention in regard to the mode in which this must be performed. The Calvinists argue that the verb “lambanein” denotes that the administrant place the consecrated bread into the hands of the communicants, who convey it to their mouths. They also contend that this was the mode in which the Lord administered communion to His disciples. Now as to the force of “lambanein,” Mark 15:23 and John 19:30 show that it can also be executed by conveying a substance directly to the mouth; for thus our Lord took the vinegar while hanging on the cross. And while admitting as probable that the Lord placed the bread into the hands of His disciples, while admitting also as a historical fact that in the early Church this mode was followed, and has therefore been called “encheiräsis,” i.e., placing the bread in the communicant’s hands, we still deny that a hard and
fast rule can be established from a probable fact and an extra-scriptural custom. The Church had a good reason for adopting the mode now in use among us of conveying the bread directly to the mouth of the communicant, which is called “metadosis.” In the course of time a pious custom had sprung up in the Church: communicants thought that they would express greater reverence for the Lord’s body if they would not receive it with the bare hands, and thus brought with them a special receptacle which was called a “docheion,” and into which the administrant placed the bread, leaving them to convey it to their mouths. These receptacles came to be marks of the station of their owners. Rich persons had very elaborate “docheia,” and the whole piously conceived custom became an occasion of self-glorification, ostentation and pride, and thus a public offence. Moreover, from a superstitious thought communicants would take the bread home with them, instead of eating it and would use it as a charm on all sorts of occasions. This put it into the minds of the pastors to change the mode of “encheiräsis” to that of “metadosis.” The entire matter must be treated as an “adiaphoron” and left to the discretion of Christians in the use of their Christian liberty. We resist the Calvinistic argument, not because we consider “metadosis” binding on our consciences, but because they want to make “encheiräsis” so.
The breaking of the bread, which was mentioned in the record of the institution was for no purpose except that of conveying a convenient particle of bread to the communicants. The distribution and reception are the essential thing, not the mode. Luther argues on the strength of Isaiah 58:7: “Brich dem Hungerigen dein Brot,” “deal thy bread to the hungry,” and Lamentations 4:4: “Die Jungen heischen Brot und niemand brach ihnen,” “the young children ask bread and no man breaketh it unto them,” that according to the Hebrew idiom, “breaking” means giving, distributing sharing, conveying, etc., and no argument can be set up in favor of any particular mode on the strength of this term, XX, 236. Hunnius employs the reductio ad absurdum against the punctiliousness of Calvinists on this point. He says: If they wish to be so very scrupulous about imitating every action of our Lord, and every circumstance that is connected with this sacrament, they must also go to an inn, and that, to an upper room, must recline on couches and celebrate the sacrament only at night; for all these features attended the first celebration. He cites, in addition to the passages cited by Luther, also the remark in Gesenius, that during the famine in Canaan, Jacob learned that bread was being broken in Egypt, i.e., bread was to be had there. The Calvinists and Socinians surprise us by their great conscientiousness at this point; we should imagine that after they had ruled the heavenly elements out of the Lord’s Supper, it should matter only very little to them in what way the remainder, the earthly elements are used. But they have a reason for being so insistent at this point, and their reason is the very ground of our opposition to them, Ursinus, one of their dogmaticians says: “Fractio panis est de essentia et forma coenae Domini, ideoque non omittenda, eaque Christus est usus, non gratia dividendi et distribuendi, sed mortis suae repraesentandi gratia.” The Socinian theologian Ostorodes writes: “Man soll das Brot brechen…. Ideo etiam Calviniani fractionem propugnant, ‘dass dadurch der abgoettische falsche Wahn vom Leib Christi in der unter dem Brot am aller kraeftigsten zerbrochen und dem gemeinen verwirrten Volk aus den Herzen geraeumet werde’ sunt verba Parei [sic].”
As regards the words used by the administrant during the administration of the Lord’s Supper (Spendeformel), the liturgies of the early Christian Churches show that these were not alike in all places. All the ancient liturgies testify to the real presence of the body and blood of Christ in the sacrament. The words of institution are recited in the act of consecration. But in the act of distribution the ancient Church did not recite these words (Christ says: “Take, eat,” etc.) but put them into the form of a confession: “Take, eat, this is,” etc. The new formula of distribution introduced into the state church of Germany by King Frederic IV: “Take, eat; Christ says: This is,” etc., would have appeared blasphemous to the early Christians, inasmuch as such a formula would have implied, in their view, mistrust of the truthfulness of the Lord’s words.
The Wittenberg faculty in 1619 declared that the recitation of certain words during the administration of the sacrament was no essential part of the sacramental action; however, it would not be proper to make the distribution an actio nuda, a dumb performance; hence to remind the Christians of the Savior’s work and to rouse in them the fervor of devotion, the minister should accompany the distribution with a few proper remarks.
8. – 12. These sections speak of the communicants and what each and every one of them receives in communion. The communicants are the finis cui, or the subiectum or the obiectum personale of the Eucharist, the persons for whose benefit the sacrament was instituted. The Lord administered the sacrament to “the disciples,” Matthew 26:26, 27, that is, to persons who had been received into fellowship with Him, respectively, had been baptized and who were publicly professing faith in Him. Some proficiency in Christian intelligence is required in those who are admitted to the Lord’s Supper; for in 1st Corinthians 11:28, 29 communicants are required to “examine themselves,” and so (“kai houtoos,” i.e., if after self-examination they have discovered that they are worthy) “eat,” etc. “‘Dokimadzetoo heauton’ means: Let him test himself, put himself to proof, whether he is sincere or not (Farrar). Let him search into his frame of mind and moral condition (‘tän dianoian heautou’, Theodore of Mopsuestia) to see whether he will not partake unworthily” (Meyer). Baier says that this self examination should be instituted along two lines: on the one hand, the communicant should by repentance withdraw from sin of which he finds himself guilty; for it would militate against the proper use of the sacrament to remain in sin; on the other hand, he should with true faith embrace the forgiveness of sins offered in the sacrament. If he fails to find himself qualified by repentance and faith for communion, and still continues, he does so “anaxioos,” unworthily. “Now inasmuch as natural depravity is not extirpated even from regenerate Christians; all Christians are naturally not worthy to commune. The unworthiness of which the apostle speaks, must, therefore, be of a particular kind; it must refer to the particular conduct of Christians on the occasion of their communing, not to their general character. Such a careless, irreverent and defiant spirit as characterized the communions at Corinth, where the sacramental occasions were turned into banquets and debaucheries, renders one unfit for the sacrament. For the person communing in such a frame of mind does not discern the Lord’s body, i.e., he makes no distinction between common food and the sacramental food, common eating and drinking and the sacramental eating and drinking. ‘Mä diakrinoon to sooma’, if he does not form a judgment on
the body, i.e., the body ‘kat’ exochän’, the sacred body, into communion with which he enters” (rather, which he receives) “by partaking of the Supper and respecting which, therefore, he ought to form a judgment of the most careful kind, such as may bring him into full and deep consciousness of its sacredness and saving significance,” Meyer. The whole tenor of the apostle’s remarks in this place is such as to make the reader feel that he wants to warn the unworthy communicant against taking any risk against his soul by communing without repentance and faith; unworthy communicants, namely, eat and drink “damnation” to themselves. “Krima” without the article means a “penal judgment, a verdict that they have become guilty of wrong and must suffer for it. It does not necessarily denote eternal damnation, but verses 30, 31 show that the apostle probably thought of temporal afflictions, such as sickness and death, by which God brings to the minds of men their faults and wrong-doings. But, of course, the sin of unworthy communing, if not repented of, may lead to eternal damnation.
The Lutheran Church, in order to safeguard its members against communing unworthily, and in order to carry out the rule which the apostle has here laid down, not only trains its members by a course of indoctrination for their first communion, but has furthermore introduced the announcement of communion to the pastor as the spiritual advisor, and the confessional or preparatory service. Moreover, it is certainly in full accord with the teaching of the apostle to practice “close communion,” that is, to administer the Lord’s Supper not indiscriminately to anyone who happens to be present at a communion occasion and is willing to partake of communion, but to such, who are known to the Church and the pastor as professing disciples.
Still with all these safeguards thrown around them in regard to the holy sacrament, it is impossible for men to prevent hypocrites who sham repentance and faith while at heart they are unbelievers, from communing. The question whether Judas communed is debated pro and con. Our text-book evidently takes the view that he did by citing Luke 22:21 in this connection.
Communion, when administered according to the institution of the Lord must be sub utraque specie, not sub una specie. That is, not only the consecrated bread, but also the consecrated cup must be given to the communicants. The withdrawal of the cup from lay communicants is a plain mutilation of the sacrament and in defiance of Matthew 26:27 and Mark 14:24. This communion sub una specie was first decreed by the Roman Church at the Council of Constanz in 1415. The reason offered for this change at the time was truly blasphemous. The decree establishing this custom reads thus: “Generale concilium declarat, decernit et definit contra hunc errorem (de communione laicorum sub utraque specie) quod licet Christus post coenam instituerit et suis discipulis administrarit sub utraque specie panis et vini hoc venerabile sacramentum; attamen, hoc non obstante, sacrorum canonum auctoritas et approbata consuetudo ecclesiae servavit et servat, quod… in primitiva ecclesia huiusmodi sacramentum reciperentur a fidelibus sub utraque specie et a laicis, tantum modo sub specie panis suscipiatur, cum firmissime credendum sit et nullatenus dubitandum, integrum Christi corpus et sanguinem, tam sub specie panis, quam sunt sub specie vini veracites continetur”; that is: “Over and against the error (of laymen receiving communion of both kinds) the general Council declares, decrees and orders that, notwithstanding the fact
that Christ after the (paschal) supper instituted and administered to His disciples this venerable sacrament under the two-fold aspect of bread and wine, nevertheless the authority of the canon laws and the appointed practice of the church has maintained and maintains that… in the early church this sacrament was received by believers in both kinds, and by laymen only in one kind, inasmuch as we must firmly believe and in now wise doubt that the entire body and blood of Christ is truly contained in the element of the bread as well as in that of the wine.” We took notice of this error before when we spoke of the Roman error of concomitance. The defiant language of the Council of Constanz “hoc non obstante” drew from Luther the following remark: “Die loebliche Stadt hat einen feinen Namen: ‘Constantia’, das heisst Bestand oder fest maennlich Gemuete, daher sie es nennen Constantiiense concilium. Aber ich, Dr. Martinus, taufe sie nach ihrem rechten Namen, den sie ihnen selber hierin gegeben haben, obstantiense [sic] concilium obstantia aber heisst Widerstand. Denn hie habe sie nicht allein mit der Tat wider Christum und seine Kirche gehandelt, sondern nehmen sich dazu und bestaetigen, dass Christus wohl moege setzen was er will; aber die Herren obstantiensis [sic] concilii wollen dawider setzen und ihn nicht ansehen, noch seine Kirche dazu. Non obstante Christo et ecclesia, sagen sie frei heraus; Christus sammt seiner Kirche soll uns nicht widerstehen, wir sind wohl ein hoeher und ander Christus und Kirche, denn jene sind,” XIX, 1396f. About 27 years after Luther had thus scored the Roman communion sub una specie, the Council of Trent met and in its 21st and 22nd sessions in 1562 (July 16) anathematized and cursed communion sub utraque specie. Moreover, to ridicule the Christian sacrament they have according to the account of Alphonsus Testatus introduced a mock ceremony of this kind: After the laymen have communed the priests will offer them a cup of wine that has not been consecrated to facilitate their swallowing the bread. The Germans call this “Spuelkelch.”
13. – 15. In these sections there is set forth what the dogmaticians call the finis cuius, that is, the ends or the results for the obtaining of which the sacrament has been instituted. It is also called fructus aut effectus sacramenti, because the sacraments, being efficacious means of grace, produce these ends or results.
13. Chief among these, like in baptism, is that greatest and all-embracing effect of divine grace, the forgiveness of sin, which is offered and sealed by means of the Lord’s Supper. This chief effect includes, by its very nature, other effects which are naturally connected with the forgiveness of sins, such as life everlasting, strengthening of faith, firmer union with Christ. “Remission of sins” is plainly stated in Matthew 26:28 as the end for which the Lord instituted the sacrament. In the sacrament, that by which forgiveness of sins has been produced, viz., the body and blood of Christ, is given to those desiring salvation, and thus their faith in the forgiveness is certified. The phrase “eis aphesin ha martioon” expresses purpose and shows that it is in accordance with the instruction of the Author of the sacrament that communicants seek this blessing in communion. Hence sacramental eating and drinking is not [an] end in itself, but a means to an end, viz., communicants are to be assured by this sacrament of the wonderful gift of the remission of sins, or what comes to the same thing, that Christ is their Savior.
14. 15. This effect is attained by faith, and the sacrament is so constituted that it proves a powerful incentive
to faith. The Lord states [in] 1st Corinthians 11:25 that He has instituted the sacrament “eis tän emän (=emou) anamnäsin,” “for my remembrance.” Luther: “Ich hoffe, es sei hier nich not, lange zu lehren, was da heisse ‘Christi Gedaechtniss’, davon wir anderswo oft und viel gelehret haben, naemlich, dass es nicht sei das Betrachten des Leidens, damit etliche, als mit einem guten Werk, wollen Gott gedienet und Gnade erlanget haben, gehen um mit Trauern um das bittere Leiden Christi, usw. Sondern das ist Christi Gedaechtniss: so man die Kraft und Frucht seines Leidens lehret und glaubt. Also, dass unsere Werke und Verdienste nichts sind, sondern allein durch Christi Leib und Tod von Suenden los und fromm werden, dass es sei ein gut Lehren und Gedaechtniss von der Gnade Gottes in Christo und nicht ein Werk von uns gegen Gott getan,” X, 2188. Gerhard: “Christ does not say: ‘Do this in remembrance of my pains and anguish which I have suffered for you, but in remembrance of me, that is, in grateful and believing remembrance of my boundless love, which caused me to suffer and die for you, and which made me ready to suffer even more for you, if this passion and death of mine had not been a sufficient ransom for your sins’.” Accordingly, communicants who commune with these facts of their Savior’s love before them “do show forth the Lord’s death.
The Lord has called the sacrament “a new testament in my blood.” Luther insists that this is the proper connection of the words. “Wir antworten, dass diese Worte, Luke 22:20: ‘Das ist der Kelch, das neue Testament in meinem Blut’ nicht sollen noch moegen also zu verstehen sein, dass dies Wort ‘in meinem Blut’ solle gehoeren zu dem Wort ‘das ist der Kelch’ wie dieser Geist fuer grosser lauter mutwilliger Bosheit vergibt, sondern zu dem Wort ‘ein neu Testament’, wie sie auch nach einander natuerlich stehen und folgen; dass also so viel sei gesagt: Dieser Kelch ist ein neu Testament, nicht durch sich selbst; denn er vielleicht in Glas oder Silber ist; sondern darum, dass mein Blut da ist; durch dasselbige Blut ist er ein neu Testament. Denn wer den Kelch also empfaehet, der empfaehet das neue Testament, das ist, Vergebung der Suenden und ewiges Leben,” XX, 278f. Again: “Was ist denn nun dies Testament oder was wird uns darinnen bescheiden von Christo? Fuerwahr, ein grosser, ewiger, unaussprechlicher Schatz, naemlich Vergebung der Suenden, wie die Worte klar lauten: Dies ist der Kelch eines neuen ewigen Testaments in meinem Blut, das fuer euch und fuer viele vergossen wird, zur Vergebung der Suende. Als sollte er sagen: Siehe da, Mensch, ich sage dir zu und bescheide dir mit diesen Worten Vergebung der Suenden und das ewige Leben. Und dass du gewisst seiest und wissest, dass solch Geluebde dir unwiderruflich bleibe, so will ich darauf sterben und mein Leib und Blut dafuer geben und beides dir zum Zeichen und Siegel hinter mir lassen, dabei du meiner gedenken sollst, wie er saget, Luke 22:9: ‘So oft ihr das tut, so gedenkt an mich’,” XIX, 1043.
What renders communion especially impressive to the believer is because a personal and direct assurance is given him individually that his sins are forgiven. “The promise of the Gospel, that whosoever believes in Christ, shall not perish but have everlasting life, is indeed universal. However, since consciences which are troubled and terrified by a feeling of their sin, God’s anger, and their own unworthiness, not infrequently doubt whether this promise applies to them individually, so that they might support themselves with it in true faith before the judgment-seat of God, and might raise themselves up with it against the accusations of the Law, sin
and Satan, therefore, Christ hands to him individually His body and blood, in order that as ‘faithful witness’, Revelation 4:5 He may assure them over against all these various trials and insults (which their souls suffer) that the promise of the Gospel and the blessings thereby conferred verily belong to them, since in the Holy Supper they feasted with the body of Christ, which was given into death for them, and with His blood, which was shed for their sins, which facts are the source and foundation of the Gospel promise,” Gerhard. Accordingly, Luther says: “Darum hat der Luther recht gelehret, dass wer ein boes Gewissen hat von Suenden, der solle zum Sakrament gehen und Trost holen nicht am Brot und Wein, nicht am Leib und Blut Christi, sondern am Wort, das in Sakrament mir den Leib und Blut Christi also fuer mich gegeben und vergossen, darbeitet, schenkt und gibt,” XX, 275.
Inasmuch as the afore-mentioned needs of troubled consciences will exist in the Kingdom of Grace at all times, Christ has made the sacrament a memorial of His atonement “till he come,” 1st Corinthians 11:26. In the Kingdom of Glory there will be no sacramental communion, because there will be no need of them. Our present communions are a bond that connects us with the Lord for whom we wait to take us to His heavenly banquet, where we shall with Him “eat bread in the Kingdom of” His Father, i.e., enjoy the full fruition of all that our faith has embraced. And since the Lord’s Supper assures us of the forgiveness of our sins, it makes us certain of attaining to the life everlasting. We may, with the ancient Church call the sacramental food “esca viatorum,” the “Bread to pilgrims given,” the heavenly manna, which nourishes us and feeds us for eternal life. Luther in his quaint way has drawn a proof for the resurrection of the body from the manducatio oralis, which occurs in the sacrament. Since Christ deigns to unite His flesh and blood with our body, our faith beholds in this fact a confirmation of the hope that our bodies shall not forever remain a prey of corruption but shall for Christ’s sake rise for the life without end. Luther says: Das Herz weiss wohl, was der Mund isset. Denn es fasset die Worte und isset das geistliche, welches der Mund leiblich isset. Weil aber der Mund des Herzens Gliedmass ist, muss er endlich auch in Ewigkeit leben, um des Herzens willen, welches durchs Wort ewiglich lebet, weil er hier auch leiblich isset dieselbige ewige Speise, die sein Herz mit ihm geistlich isset,” XX, 831. In like manner Baier declares that in the Lord’s Supper “cor contritum et peccatis oneratum reficitur, pavida mens erigitur, ita ut non esuriat neque sitiat, sed habeat vitam in se, habeat vitam aeternam, John 6:33ff.” And he cites Gerhard as teaching that “ex unione cum Christo proveniat, ut novas vires, tamquam palmites ex vita, consequamur pugnandi contra Satanam, resistendi desideriis carnis, proficiendi in gratia et.”
In the believing communicant there occurs, as a matter of course, a strengthening of the unio mystica, that is, of that wonderful union which exists between Christ, the Head, and the believers, His body. But it would be erroneous to believe that, because this union is in the Lord’s Supper strengthened by the agency of substances, the union itself becomes a substantial one. There is only one union of Christ possible, and that is a spiritual one, effected by faith. Outside of this unio spiritualis there is not another unio sacramentalis between the believing communicant and Christ; but the unio spiritualis, which prior to communion existed between the believer and his Lord is strengthened by the Lord’s Supper, as it is by every other means of grace. The meaning of the apostle in 1st Corinthians
10:17: “We, being many, are one body,” can only be: “one spiritual body.” The “many” in this text are the believing Christians. Unbelievers, indeed, at communion receive also the body and blood of Christ, but instead of thereby becoming united with Christ, their unbelief rather makes them objects of condemnation, on account of 1st Corinthians 11:29. Baier, quoting Gerhard, says: “nothing is nearer to and more closely united with the Son of God than His assumed human nature, which He has united to Himself with a personal bond. Likewise there is nothing more closely united with us than what we eat and drink, because it is converted into our substance. Accordingly, Christ desiring to unite Himself with us and us with Himself in the closest manner, instituted this sacrament, in which we eat His body in the blessed bread and drink His blood in the blessed wine.” Thus Gerhard repeats an observation of Tauler. However, he adds warningly, that he is not saying that the spiritual food of the sacrament is altered and changed within us, but that it changes and alters us so that we become partakers of the divine nature, 2nd Peter 1:4, and members of the mystic body, whose head is Christ, Ephesians 5:30.
The finis cuius of the sacrament, as we have just now depicted it, is utterly rejected by the Reformed Sects, who deny the presence of the body and blood of the Lord in the sacrament, and hence are forced to deny that the sacrament gives forgiveness of sins, life and salvation. To them communion seasons are memorial occasions on which the believers review the death of the Redeemer. That is all. The Roman Catholic Church by injecting into this sacrament, like into all other acts of worship its ex opere operato teaching, has made communion a dumb show. Moreover, by their mass they have changed the ordained sacramental use of the body and blood of Christ into another which has not been instituted at all. They call their mass a sacrificium incruentum, “an unbloody sacrifice.” The papistic illusion proceeds along these lines: A Roman priest transforms bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ, and then offers up this Christ to God as a sacrifice for the sins not only of such as happen to be living and present at the mass, but even for such as are absent, yea, are dead and in purgatory. More than this, the benefits of the mass are so great, that not only blemishes of the soul, like sin, are removed by it, but also injuries to the body. There are public and private masses in the Roman Church. The only difference is that at the former the concourse of worshippers or sight-seeing visitors furnishes a crowd of gaping spectators. From what we have so far learned not only regarding the elements, but also regarding the intended use of the sacrament, we are prepared to say that the Romish mass is nothing but a jugglery, dressed up in the habiliments of religion. What the priests pretend to do in their mass is not done with the body and blood of Christ; for that is not present at all, but with the bread and the wine only. Their cunning and avarice, however, has contrived to make the mass a rich source of revenue, because they claim to remove sin from the living and the dead by the hocus-pocus which they perform at their altars, and miserably cheat and humbug the ignorant. This is the reason, too, why in spite of the crushing arguments brought against them, they hold tenaciously to the mass, and for the glorification of it have lately installed their great Eucharistic Congress, one of which was held a few years ago (1910?) at Montreal, Canada.
Besides the finis cuius principalis, which we named before, the theologians speak of lesser ends for which the sacrament was instituted (fines minus principales). Among
these are the union of the various communicants, who commune at the same altar by bonds of fellowship and love, the public attestation and approval of their common faith, the increase of gratitude to God and charity to our fellowmen, which should result from obtaining and believing communion, the greater readiness and cheerfulness to take up our respective crosses and bear them after Christ etc.

§138. Efficacy and Resistibility of the Means of Grace.

The Word and sacraments possess supernatural virtue. “Such is the efficacy of the Word wherever seriously contemplated, heard and used, that it never departs without fruit, but always awakens new understanding, pleasure and devoutness, and produces a pure heart and pure thoughts. For these words are not inoperative or dead, but creative, living words,” Large Catechism, Part I, paragraph 101, Jacobs, page 404f. This fact and a number of the effects were noted in connection with the preceding paragraphs. This power inheres in the Word considered finally, namely as the expression of the divine mind. The mere matter of the divine Word, either in its written characters, or in its spoken sounds has no supernatural power and cannot be used as a charm. The power of the Word is indeed by the design of its Author inherent in the written or spoken Word, Isaiah 55:10, 11, and is peculiar to it. It is not the logical force of its arguments, nor its rhetorical power or moral excellency; for these qualities the Word may be said to possess in common with the word of man, but the supernatural energy of God which is imparted to the Word for supernatural ends about which logic, rhetoric, ethics are not concerned. For this reason there are, on the one hand, ascribed to the author effects of which God alone can be the Author. The effects are caused by it instrumentally, confer 1st Corinthians 15:2: “by which also ye are salved.” On the other hand, the treatment which men accord the Word is represented as extending to God, Romans 10:16, 21; Luke 10:16. In particular, it is the Holy Spirit, He who in accordance with Christ’s promise is to teach men all things and to guide them into all truth, whose energy is manifested through the Word. He it was who inspired its penmen, and He has indissolubly joined I Himself to it, making it for all time the living voice of God to man. Hence it is, that contempt of the Word may run into the sin against the Holy Ghost. “We are to assume here not only a certain conjunction or union of distinct actions or even a unity of aims or effects, but also a unity of energy and operation. For the Holy Spirit does not by Himself do something, and the Word of God by itself something else in the conversion of men, but they produce the one effect by the same action. For such is the peculiar nature of the principal and the subordinate causes, intrinsically united together, that they produce an effect by one and the same action. Thus the soul and the eye see by a single action, and not by distinct actions,” Quenstedt. Still basing on the statement, Isaiah 55:11, the efficacy of the Word also extra usum, he employs these figures: grain has germinating virtue also when stored in the granary; the sin is shining also during an eclipse. This point our theologians had to defend against the Enthusiasts, who held that the Holy Spirit operated rather irrespectively of the Word than through it; against the Calvinists, who, biased by their doctrine of predestination, held that the Word possessed this power only in such cases where
God chose; and against the Lutheran pastor Rathmann (†1628) who “compares the Word of God to a statue of Mercury, to a picture, to a sign and even to a channel, namely to instruments altogether passive and inoperative. He asserts, moreover, that the divine efficacy is external to the Word of God, separable from it at any moment and merely auxiliary; that the Holy Spirit with His virtue joins Himself to the Word only in the mind or heart of man, and even that only then, when it is legitimately and savingly used,” Quenstedt. All these views, in effect, place the Word of God on a level with a mere human word. On the other hand, it must be just as firmly held that the Word does not operate physically, like opium, poison, fire etc. When our theologians, therefore, speak of the natural efficacy of the Word, the term natural must not be pressed, so as to bring it into contrast with supernatural. “We say that there is a natural efficacy in the Word of God, because it naturally belongs to it, and its essence and nature are such that it could not be the true Word of God unless it contained within itself that divine power and virtue to convert men,” Quenstedt. Baier issues this warning: “To avoid ambiguity and dispute we avoid the use of this term.” Likewise, in the statement that the Word is efficacious, when not in use, the meaning is only that it possesses efficacy, not that it exerts efficacy automatically or mechanically. Hollaz employs this simile: “The hand of a sleeping man does nothing, yet neither is the power of action bestowed on it in vain, nor is the hand thus inoperative, dead.”
By its inherent efficacy the Word approaches all men with the same gracious mission. The world, irrespective of nationality and of its prior relation to God and His Church, Romans 1:16, yea, the unwilling world, Romans 2:4, is approached by the Word of grace. It pleads with all men in an equally earnest and efficacious manner, Matthew 23:37. But it does not operate by main force, by the bare omnipotent power of God. The power and grace of God are resistible. Because the manner of the teaching of God’s Word is persuasive. It endeavors to win the heart of man, to gain his affections, bend his will towards the matters which it proposes. Over and against its gracious overtures man has the power of refusal, and he can employ this power to such a degree as to shut out the saving effects of the Word, and thus render the Word inefficient actu secundo to himself. Instances of such opposition are cited under section 5, Outlines, page 172. It is, however, not every kind of resistance which man sets up against the Word of grace that frustrates its operation. For there is an ordinary inclination to resist in every heart. When the resistance becomes defiant, contumacious, obstinate and continued, it is then that the Word fails to effect the ends for which it was made efficient. When this occurs in particular instances, and why it does not occur in all instances, this is a matter to be considered (as far as it can be considered at all) in connection with the doctrine of conversion.

§139. Operations of the Holy Spirit.

Among the operations mentioned in this paragraph, justification has not been named in connection with vocation etc., because it is not an operation which takes place in man; nor has illumination, because it is best connected with the other immediate effects of the call.

§140. Vocation.

The sinner, for whom the work of the Redeemer has been performed, is ignorant either of the fact that there is salvation prepared, or that it is prepared for him. Nor does he care to know either. (See the connection of 2nd Timothy 1:9 with the preceding verse; also 2nd Thessalonians 2:14, 13.) An overture must be made to him on the part of God. Man makes no overtures to God. The overture comes in the form of an invitation, or call (vocatio, “kläsis”). This is extended through the Gospel, 2nd Thessalonians 2:14, or the sacraments, Acts 2:38, whenever the sinner is approached by them, Colossians 1:28; John 5:39; Acts 2:41.
This call is universal, not only because all men are equally in need of it, but because Christ has ordered it extended to all, Matthew 11:28; Matthew 28:19. (“Many” in Matthew 20:16 contrasted to “few.”) Human wretchedness, however, is not a cause of the call, but an occasion for the divine pity. In asserting the universality of the call, we do not propose to produce historical evidence showing that each and every man in every age has had the doctrine announced to him individually, but only this, that God has published the Gospel in such a manner, that it is possible for all men, without exception, to arrive at the knowledge of salvation. At least three times God has revealed His grace to the whole world, by the Adamitic, the Noahitic, the Apostolic Church. This knowledge was always given to be preserved and handed down to future generations. To make this easy, God had the Gospel written. (“Quo non venit ‘apostolä’ en ‘epistolä’, Hutter.) God cannot be charged with the effects of man’s neglect. Besides, it is not known how many are the ways in which the saving knowledge has been and is being disseminated in the world. “If the case of the Gentile children is to be adduced, the answer to this and similar things is: the judgments of God may be hidden; they can never be unjust. Many things pertaining to this head are beyond our reach by the light of nature and of grace, which we will at some time understand better by the light of glory,” Gerhard.
Being universal, the call is also equal, as regards essentials, but unequal as regards the circumstances of time and degree. “We cannot, in this present mortal state entirely fathom this accidental inequality; let us acquiesce in God’s dispensation of the means of salvation; let us acknowledge and admire, but not anxiously explore, the abyss of divine judgments inscrutable to human minds,” Hollaz. “Let us admit that… we cannot find out and explain exactly the courses of the divine counsels; nevertheless, we must by no means have recourse to an absolute decree of reprobation, but adhere firmly to those asserted general statements, 1st Timothy 2:4; Ezekiel 33:11,” Quenstedt.
“Of this we should not judge according to our reason also not according to the Law or from any external appearance. Neither should we attempt to investigate the secret, concealed abyss of divine predestination, but should give heed to the revealed will of God,” Formula of Concord, “Solid Declaration, “Chapter XI, paragraph 26, Jacobs, page 653. “We must in every way hold rigidly and firmly to this, viz. that as the preaching of repentance so also the promise of the Gospel is universal, i.e. it pertains to all men (Luke 24),” ibid, paragraph 28, page 654.
The call of which we speak is that special or direct call, properly and strictly so-called, which occurs by means of the Gospel and proposes to the sinner repentance and faith in
Christ, and aims to bring men into the Church (vocatio directa, specialis, propria). We are not speaking of the indirect, general vocation, so-called in a wider sense, which arises from the contemplation of the created universe, from the truths of natural theology, divine providence and government, and which lead men to the door of the Church.
The saving call is a mediate and ordinary call, by the medium of the Gospel-ministry, not immediate and extraordinary by God Himself. “We use the term ‘immediate’ not with reference to the medium of the Word, without which no salutary call can take place, but in reference to men, because God Himself presented the Word without human assistance. Thus Genesis 12:1; Acts 9:3, 4,” Quenstedt. This latter has clearly ceased, since the Gospel has been preached universally and the Church planted by the apostles.
The saving call is a call of pure grace, hence exclusively by the Gospel. Hollaz says: “The divine Law contributes something to the call of sinners,” but he at once limits his statement quite considerably thus: “but only indirectly, negatively and accidentally.” Our Confessions ascribe to the Law not the quickening of the heart of faith, but the contrition of the heart. “He terrifies, he says, for this reason, viz. that there may be a place for consolation and quickening, because hearts that are secure and do not feel the wrath of God loathe consolation. In this manner, Scripture is accustomed to join these two, the terrors and the consolation, in order to teach that in repentance there are these chief members, contrition and faith that consoles and justifies. Neither do we see how the nature of repentance can be presented more clearly and simply. (We know with certainty that God thus works in His Christians in His Church.) For the two chief works of God in man are these, to terrify and to justify and quicken those who have been terrified. Into these two works all Scripture has been distributed. The one part is the Law, which shows, reproves and condemns sins. The other part is the Gospel, i.e., the promise of grace bestowed in Christ, and this promise is constantly repeated in the whole of Scripture, first having been delivered to Adam (‘I will put enmity’, etc. [Genesis 3:15]): afterwards to the patriarchs; then, still more clearly proclaimed by the prophets; lastly, preached and set forth among the Jews by Christ, and disseminated over the entire world by the apostles. For all the saints were justified by faith in this promise, and not by their own attrition or contrition,” “Apology,” Chapter V, Article XII, paragraphs 51-54, Jacobs, page 185f. “The Law is the word which reproves and condemns sin,” ibid., page 184. The call is issued when the Gospel is being used. Quenstedt distinguishes between the “solemn call… through the preached Word, and the less solemn… through the read Word.” The call is an earnest (seria, non simulata). He sends His servants with unconditional invitation: “Come without money and price,” Isaiah 55:1. Every call is efficacious, because God, the Author, intends it to be so, and the means for its extension, the Gospel, has the power to make it so and does make it so. The inefficacy of the call in actu secundo, so far as the actual result is concerned, arises not from the Author nor from the means of the call, but from the perverse will of man. The Calvinistic distinction between external and internal call cannot be admitted, when the two are viewed as opposed to and separate from one another. “If the external call did not exactly correspond to the internal call, if a person might be called externally, but not internally, the call would be vain, fallacious and illusory,” Quenstedt.

§141. Effects of the Call.

Satanic influences, seconded by man’s callousness, Luke 8:12 and Luke 14:18 may cause the call to be declined, even in cases where the consciences have been perceptibly smitten (Agrippa, Felix). Sunlight is hostile to creatures of nocturnal habits, and so is the light of the Gospel to those who have become habituated to spiritual darkness, John 3:19ff. The depths of Satan and of the carnal mind, which is enmity to God, are not fathomed by our reason. God has denied us a full perception of the working of His grace in individual instances. We can discover no boundary beyond which God ceases to pursue particular sinners with His rescuing love. Men in like condition of utter helplessness are approached by a Helper, equally gracious and sincere to all and of adequate power to cope with any difficulty in man, and yet the results of the work of rescue differ. This disparity of results raises the staggering question: Cur alii prae aliis? This question will never be answered on earth. The two solutions which have been proposed, one by fatalism, the other by synergism, are both disparaging to the truth of the divine Word, to the genuineness of the Gospel-grace and to the purity of Christian faith: the one is a denial of universality and equality of grace, the other, of the universality and equality of sin. Reason is shipwrecked in every attempt to harmonize with the actual results of the work of grace, which are manifest in the life and history of the Church. A sacrifice is here demanded, a sacrifice of the desire to know, to adequately grasp and to understand logically the work of God in the minds of men. Self-abasing faith, which imposes captivity on reason and quells the proud uprisings of the will, patiently and trustfully coercing both not to run beyond the limits of that knowledge of spiritual things, which the Word of God affords to men, and not to attempt an explanation, which, after all explains nothing, faith alone enables us to rest the case with the Author of man’s salvation, whose ways are past finding out. Any theology, which fails to acknowledge a mystery at this point, becomes, ipso facto, suspected of treasonable intent against the truths of Scripture afore-mentioned.
In discussing the effects of the call in those who have obeyed it, we meet with a difficulty of an altogether different sort. It is not lack of information, but the proper sorting and distinguishing of the abundance of information that Scripture furnishes us, that creates this difficulty. The effects of sin upon the sinner are many and various accordingly, the effects of grace exerted against sin must likewise be many and various. A new condition is created for and in the sinner by his acceptation of the call of grace. This new condition may be viewed as a unit and called by some general term such as “the new life.” It may, however, also be viewed in detail a) either as to its beginning or its continuation, b) either as it effects man inwardly, or as it effects him outwardly, c) either as it changes his relation to God, or to his fellowmen, d) either as it becomes manifest in his intellect, or in his affections, or in his will etc. A number of terms, all seemingly describing particular acts of grace, tend to create confusion, not only by their multitude, but still more by the fact that most, if not all of them are employed in a wide and in a strict meaning. The most important of these terms are: illumination, regeneration, conversion, repentance, resurrection (vivification), justification, renovation and sanctification.
All these terms refer to the ordo salutis, the divinely ordained process by which a sinner is guided from spiritual death to spiritual life, and is preserved therein unto the glory everlasting. Each term expresses the effect of grace in or upon the sinner, as regarded from a particular view point. Each term may express that effect as it takes place instantaneously and for the first time, or as it is continued and repeated in the life of a believer (Actus-status). The scope of each term when used in the latter sense is naturally wider than in the former. And the reason why each term may have this twofold scope is because sin exists in man not only up to the moment of the acceptance of the call, but also after the call has been accepted, and must accordingly be resisted by grace up to that moment, when even the possibility to commit sin is destroyed, i.e., up to the moment of death. Thus, e.g., repentance is predicated of a person when he first is contrite over his sin and a believer in the divine forgiveness of sins. In that same moment he is also righteous before God by virtue of the imputed righteousness of Christ, which his faith appropriates, in other words, justified. In the same moment he also rises from spiritual death, in other words, his spiritual resurrection or vivification takes place. In the same moment the new life is manifest in him; he has passed through regeneration. In the same moment he has turned from the former objects of his perverted affection to the former objects of his loathing; conversion has taken place. Finally, in the same moment, he is already a saint, and the first spiritual impulses of the new obedience, however faint, have begun to manifest themselves; sanctification and renovation can be predicated of him. Each term, then, might be employed – we do not say that it must be – to designate the working of the same divine grace by the agency of the same human faith in the identical moment, yet each term designates the working of faith by a particular effect, and describes the same complex situation, however, as regarded from a particular view-point. Now in the same manner as divine grace meets man’s sin in the first moment of the new life, it meets sin again and again throughout the new life to its termination. Accordingly, there is not only a primary and instantaneous, but also a continued and repeated, a daily repentance, justification, regeneration etc. The difference would be this, that while in the former instances grace deals with a child of wrath and makes him a child of grace, in the latter instance, it is applied to a child of grace and conveys more grace to him. In order to avoid confusion a speaker must state whether he employs the terms afore-mentioned in their stricter sense as applying to the first moment of the new life, or in their wider meaning as applying to the progress and continuation of that life.
However, a further separation of these terms is necessary, and a close observation of the language of Scripture enables us to make it. In the first place, the expression “justification” must be set aside as a term by itself, whether used to express the first and instantaneous justification of a believing sinner, or the daily justification of the sinning believer, who has again fallen into wrong-doing. Justification, as will be seen, does not take place in the sinner, like illumination, regeneration, sanctification, but is a forensic act of God, directed toward and upon the sinner. It does not effect the internal state of the sinner’s heart, but his relation to God. It changes not the sinner’s affection towards God, but the affection which God bears towards the sinner. For this reason, dogmaticians have hesitated to group justification with the other phases of the ordo salutis. And rightly so, for if the ordo
salutis is understood to embrace only what is going on in the sinner by the power of divine grace, justification is not part of it. Since, however, justification is not only an important, but the most important act of God bearing upon the sinner’s salvation, it is necessary to discuss it in connection with the ordo salutis, either upon the very threshold of the presentation of the ordo, or in a chapter by itself, always with this understanding, however, that justification is external not internal.
In the second place, Scripture, as will be seen, speaks with a discrimination quite perceptible of the characteristic spiritual phenomena, which occur in the first moment of the new life, and of those phenomena, which characterize the continuation of that life. It employs such terms as illumination, regeneration, conversion chiefly to describe the former, and such terms as sanctification, renovation, new obedience, chiefly for the latter operations of grace.
If now we add this additional warning, that such effects of grace as illumination, regeneration, conversion, or any other term describing what occurs in the first moment of the sinner’s spiritual life, must not be divided chronologically, but regarded as synchronous, as various aspects of the same divine operation; and in the same way, that sanctification, renovation, new obedience must not be divided in point of time, we have cleared the ground before us sufficiently for a separate view of each of the phases of the ordo before mentioned.

§142. Regeneration.

Regeneration (“palingenesias” [Tischendorf], Titus 3:5) is a figurative expression. “Its force and signification must be estimated from the analogy of generation,” Baier. The point of comparison is the engendering of life, where there is no life. Hence its terminal points, the starting point and the goal, are spiritual death and spiritual life. Quickening, or resurrection (vivification), Ephesians 2:5, 7 is a true synonym of regeneration. It is effected by the grace or mercy of God, Titus 3:5, through the Gospel, James 1:18; 1st Peter 1:23, which is powerful to induce faith, Ephesians 1:19. It is not, like physical generation, “of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God,” John 1:13. It effects both the intellect and the will. The regeneration of the intellect has for its starting point the great blindness of the heart, Ephesians 4:18; 5:8, and the general debility of the understanding, 2nd Corinthians 3:5; 1st Corinthians 2:14, in regard to the saving knowledge of the saving object; and for its goal, the spiritual capacity of the mind, savingly to know the object which brings salvation, and an actual saving knowledge of it. It is described as an opening of the eyes and a turning from darkness to light, Acts 26:18. This is nothing else than what is otherwise known as illumination. The regeneration of the will has for its starting point the incapacity of the heart to embrace savingly the good offered in the Gospel, Romans 8:7, and for its goal a confident reclining of the heart on the known good, Philippians 2:13. Accordingly, “the form of regeneration consists in the gift of spiritual life, that is, in the bestowal of the power of believing, and of saving faith; or, in the illumination of the mind and in the production of confidence in the heart; or, as it is otherwise expressed, in the gift itself of faith,” Chemnitz. Titus 3:5; John 3:3, 15-18; 1st
John 5:1. “Constat hominem per hoc ipsum renasci, quod fides in ipso accenditur,” Baier.
Regeneration, then, expresses an inward change in its subject. This change, however, does not affect the substance but the quality of the intellect and will. The expressions “new man,” and “new creature,” 2nd Corinthians 5:17; Galatians 6:15, refer to no physical change in man, although that change is illustrated in Scripture by physical actions, such as begetting of incorruptible seed, 1st Peter 1:23, travailing in birth, Galatians 4:19 and others. Regeneration does not remove or destroy the blind intellect, but the blindness of the intellect; nor the impotent will, but the impotence of the will, in matters spiritual. It does not introduce an illumined intellect in the place of the darkened understanding, but it makes the darkened intellect an illumined one etc. Still the illumined intellect and the quickened will are not merely the old intellect and will roused out of spiritual torpor and restored to the use of the faculties, which they had possessed all the time, but had not been able to engage in. For in that case regeneration would merely be the uncovering of a latent spirituality in man by the removal of a carnal crust, which had concealed the same; it would be like liberating a free man from a confinement in which he has been kept against his will. The regenerated product, so to speak, would have existed before the regenerating process. The spiritual life, which is the goal of regeneration, would not be introduced from without, but elicited from within man. Such a process would bear no comparison to that of birth or resurrection or illumination or the sowing of the seed. But regeneration results in “a new man,” a “new creature,” on account of the new qualities which are being introduced into the intellect and will of man. “As in the resurrection of the body, the flesh, numerically the same as which we have borne, shall be reproduced, furnished, however, with different properties; so, in regeneration that same natural substance remains, the properties being changed,” Quenstedt. These new properties are a positive gift of grace from God to man, not from man to himself. Thus the spiritual change, which regeneration effects, is an accidental, not a substantial one, and the expressions of Scripture, which refer to it, must not be urged beyond the point of comparison, which is the engendering of spiritual life in a human being, which spiritual life causes the person possessing it to act as a new creature, to think thoughts with his intellect, which he could not have thought before, and of himself, and to put forth volitions, which he could not have willed before and of himself. It is not the thinking faculty, but the sufficiency of the faculty to think just these thoughts, which regeneration effects, 2nd Corinthians 3:5. And it is not the will, but the willing of particular volitions (“to will,” Philippians 3:13) which regeneration creates.
The comparison of this change to resurrection and birth or the kindling of light, implies that it is instantaneous. The first holy thought and pious desire is regeneration, because it is evidence of the new life. And this first evidence of new life is a perfect regeneration. Regeneration, in its strict sense, admits of no degrees. A person cannot be more born than another. The strength of the new-born increases, and the new life manifests itself in ever growing progress, but the birth itself does not increase. What is called the daily regeneration of a regenerated person is so termed by analogy to the daily appearing of the new spiritual energy, but does not properly belong under this head. Regeneration, strictly understood, is not a synonym of reformation of life.
Our Confessions seem to use the term regeneration as a synonym for justification, for this reason, because both occur at the same time, and both are distinct from the renewal or sanctification of life consequent upon regeneration.
“The word ‘regeneration’ is employed so as to comprise at the same time the forgiveness of sins alone for Christ’s sake, and the succeeding renewal which the Holy Ghost works in those who are justified by faith. Again, it is restricted to the remission of sins and adoption as sons of God. And in this latter sense the word is much and often used in the Apology, where it is written: ‘Justification is regeneration’, although St. Paul has fixed a distinction between these words (Titus 3:5): ‘He saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Ghost’. As also the word ‘vivification’ has sometimes been used in a like sense. For if a man is justified through faith (which the Holy Ghost alone works), this is truly a regeneration, because from a child of wrath he becomes a child of God, and thus is transferred from death to life, as it is written (Ephesians 2:5): ‘When we were dead in sins, he hath quickened us together with Christ’. Also: ‘The just shall live by faith’ (Romans 1:17 [Habakkuk 2:4]). In this sense the word is much and often used in the Apology. But again, it is often taken for sanctification and renewal, which succeed the righteousness of faith, as Dr. Luther has thus used it in his book concerning the Church and the Councils,” Formula of Concord, “Solid Declaration,” Chapter III, paragraphs 19-21, Jacobs, page 572f.

§143. Conversion.

Conversion is a figurative term. Its force is estimated from a movement in or through space. The spiritual act implied by it is indicated in Scripture by such terms as “turn,” Jeremiah 31:19; Acts 26:18, 20, and “return,” 1st Peter 2:25, also by “translate,” Colossians 1:13. The subject of conversion is the same as that of regeneration, and the act is logically and chronologically the same, only presented by a different imagery. In conversion the subject is viewed as a being who has averted his face from God, who has turned his back upon God and all things divine, who is hostile to God and receives matters pertaining to God with aversion and loathing, both in his inward thoughts and in outward expressions, while he turns with delight, both internal and external, to such things as God abhors, and seeks and finds pleasure in matters on which rest the anger of God and His righteous verdict of condemnation. Or, he is viewed as a wayward sheep that has run away from the shepherd, or as a prodigal, who has deserted his home. In either case the idea of malicious, reckless and utter abandonment of what is truly good and the conscious and determined adoption of what is truly evil and destructive of the soul’s happiness is implied. Or he is viewed as a rebellious vassal who has renounced fealty to his righteous Lord, has crossed the border of his lord’s domain and has entered the domain of his lord’s mortal enemy, to whom he has sworn allegiance and under whom he has taken service against his former lord. This state of hostility to God represents the starting point, and its opposite, the goal of conversion. The goal may be viewed in two ways: it may be either that particular moment, in which the former enemy of God turns for the first time a loving and trustful face to God whom he hated, as when the stray sheep re-enters the fold, the prodigal steps across the
threshold of the home he had abandoned, or when the faithless vassal returns to his liege; or it may be the state and condition consequent upon that first moment. The former is conversion in the stricter, the latter in the wider sense. Both differ in the same way, as an act and the continuation and effect of that act. The form of conversion, accordingly, is the subjugation of the froward heart of man and its unconditional surrender to God, or the removal of hostility from the heart and the implanting of love towards God and trust in Him, or, inasmuch as all this takes place by faith in God’s pardon to His enemies through Christ, the bestowal of faith.
Like regeneration, conversion also represents a change which takes place in man, and affects both his intellect and his will. The conversion of the intellect consists in a revision of man’s natural judgment on all matters spiritual, by which not only spiritual ignorance (darkness, Acts 26:18) gives way to knowledge, but also errors are recognized and the judgment becomes restricted and submits to the Word of God as the source and norm of all spiritual knowledge. The conversion of the will embraces the abandonment of evil to which man had been prone, Ezekiel 33:11; Ephesians 2:3, sincere displeasure at sin and remorse over the guilt thereby contracted together with the desire of mercy for forgiveness, 1st Peter 2:10, for restoration to sonship with God, Galatians 4:5; 1st Peter 2:25, and the actual obtaining of the same.
This turning of the intellect and will Scripture couples with repentance, Jeremiah 21:19; Acts 26:20, “metanoia.” The passage in Jeremiah emphasizes that phase of repentance, when a person “bemoans himself,” “feels himself chastised as a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke,” “smites upon his thigh,” “is ashamed, even confounded,” “bears reproach,” verses 18, 19. With the phrase: “After that I was turned,” Jeremiah connects this meaning: “After that I was instructed,” verse 19. Hence repentance in this passage is the knowledge and conviction of sin, coupled with sincere – and even violently expressed – sorrow over its guilt and dominion. This is contrition, that state of the heart, where the spirit in man is abashed, cowed, crushed and racked with the pains of remorse over his wrongdoings, which he recognizes are wanton affronts offered to God and inviting His just anger and vindictive righteousness, and from which state the roused sinner finds himself unable to extricate himself. If in contrition the sinner is said to turn, this can only be in the sense that he abhors the state which he had loved. In Acts 26:20 the expression “repent” is coordinated with the expression “turn to God.” The helpless, wretched heart may run from contrition in either of two opposite directions: either it may resign itself to despair, or it may turn to the very God whom it has offended, suing for pardon from His mercy on Christ, the Redeemer. This is faith, which obtains the forgiveness. And hence we find “repentance” and “the forgiveness of sins” coordinated in Acts 5:31, and “repentance towards God” and “faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ,” Acts 20:21. But while being coordinated, these terms “repentance” and “faith,” are also distinguished from one another, as their separate mention in the texts quoted shows. True repentance, then, is a twofold turning: a remorseful turning from sin with its guilt and other effects, and a trustful turning to the Canceller of sin with all its consequences. Inasmuch, however, as the mere contrition of the heart without consequent faith effects no salutary change, no spiritual life in the sinner, it is not customary, in strict language, to call it repentance. But repentance proper is faith
in the forgiveness of God, and thus coincides with the terminus ad quem of conversion. Compare Acts 11:21: “A great number believed and turned to the Lord,” i.e., they turned by believing, they believed and thus turned. By its very nature, however, being faith in the forgiveness of sin, repentance always presupposes knowledge of and remorse over sin.
Turning and repentance are the work of God in the sinner. In Jeremiah 31:18 the prophet beseeches the divine power for his conversion; in verse 19 he speaks of himself converted (“I was turned,” conversio transitiva). “God gives repentance,” “and forgiveness of sins,” Acts 5:31. It is God’s work that men believe, John 6:29; faith is the operation of God, Colossians 2:12. God makes men meet for the saints’ inheritance, delivers them from the power of darkness, translates them into the Kingdom of His dear Son, Colossians 1:12, 13, raises sinners up and makes them sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus, Ephesians 2:6, gives them a new spirit and an heart of flesh in the place of the stony heart, Ezekiel 11:19.
Turning and repentance are effected by God through the Gospel. The converted are removed from under the Law and placed under grace, Galatians 4:5; Romans 6:14, receiving mercy and being made God’s people, 1st Peter 2:20, God’s sons, John 1:12 and sheep of the Shepherd and Bishop of their souls, 1st Peter 2:25.
Repentance and turning are predicated of the sinner, Acts 11:21; 26:20, and the sinner is even commanded to turn, Ezekiel 33:11, because these acts must occur in the sinner. But the sinner turns when he is turned, somewhat like a ship which obeys the rudder or the pressure of the helmsman at the rudder. This is called conversio intransitiva, because it is an action terminating in the subject of the action, not extending beyond its own self. There is also a distinction made between “active conversion, so far as it proceeds from God, and passive conversion, so far as it is received by man,” Baier. But the distinction between transitive and intransitive, active and passive conversion, must not be understood as a distinction in repentance. Either of the four terms describes the same act.
Conversion in the wider sense has to do with a converted sinner. “After that I was turned, I repented.” This statement shows that the dread of sin is a characteristic of the child of God. It continues under that grace which effected the sinner’s conversion and becomes a spiritual safeguard against a relapse into the former state. Not only is the heart changed in conversion, but also the outward conduct of the converted. “Repent, and turn to the Lord, and do works meet for repentance,” Acts 26:20. “Return unto the Lord, thy God, and obey his voice according to all that I command thee, with all thine heart and with all thy soul,” Deuteronomy 30:2. “Be not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind,” Romans 12:2; “unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ,” Ephesians 4:13 – these are directions to the converted. Luther had well caught the Spirit of Christ, when, in the first four of his 95 Theses, he stated: 1) “Our Lord and Master Jesus Christ, in saying: ‘Repent ye’, etc., intended that the whole life of believers should be penitence.” 2) “This word cannot be understood of sacramental penance, that is, of the confession and satisfaction, which are performed under the ministry of priests.” 3) “It does not, however, refer solely to inward penance; nay, such inward penance is naught unless it outwardly produces various mortifications of the flesh.” 4) “The
penalty thus continues as long as the hatred of self – that is, true inward penance – continues; namely, till our entrance into the Kingdom of Heaven.” A few statements of Scripture must be noted in this connection. “It is once for all true that in genuine conversion a change, new emotion (renewal) and movement in understanding, will and heart must occur, namely, that the heart perceive sin, dread God’s wrath, turn itself from sin, perceive and accept the promise of grace in Christ, have good spiritual thoughts, a Christian purpose and diligence, and strive against the flesh. For where none of these occurs or is present there is also no true conversion,” Formula of Concord, “Solid Declaration,” Chapter II, paragraph 70, Jacobs, page 566. This is evidently the most extended use of the term “conversion.”
However, the Confessors are also conscious that strictly speaking the renewal of life is a fruit of conversion. For they distinguish between cooperation of man prior to and after conversion; they deny the former, Jacobs, §11, 16, page 498f.; §7, page 552; §18, page 555; §24, page 557; §42, page 560; §59, page 563f.; §77, page 567, and affirm the latter, §17, page 499; §65ff., page 565; §29ff., page 558; §43ff., page 560f. In the two places named last, Luther’s standpoint is declared. Besides, the Confessors state: “We say that good fruits, good works in every kind of life, ought to follow repentance, i.e. conversion or regeneration (the renewal of the Holy Ghost in the heart). Neither can there be true conversion or true contrition, where mortifications of the flesh and good fruits do not follow (if we do not externally render good works and Christian patience). True terrors, true griefs of soul, do not allow the body to indulge in sensual pleasures, and true faith is not ungrateful to God, neither does it despise God’s commandments. In a word, there is no inner repentance, unless it also produce outwardly mortifications of the flesh. We say also that this is the meaning of John, when he says (Matthew 3:8): ‘Bring forth, therefore, fruits meet for repentance’. Likewise, of Paul when he says (Romans 6:19): ‘Yield your members servants to righteousness’; just as he likewise says elsewhere (Romans 12:1): ‘Present your bodies a living sacrifice’, etc. And when Christ says (Matthew 4:17): ‘Repent’, he certainly speaks of the entire repentance, of the entire newness of life and its fruits,” Apology, Chapter VI, §34, 35, Jacobs, page 202.
“In order, therefore, to deliver pious consciences from these labyrinths of the sophists, we have ascribed to repentance these two parts, viz. contrition and faith. If any one desire to add a third, viz. fruits worthy of repentance, i.e. a change of the entire life and character for the better (good works following conversion), we will not make any opposition,” Apology, Chapter V, §28, Jacobs, page 181.

§144. Conversion and Preparatory Acts.

The acts which constitute conversion are spiritual in character and are distinguished from natural acts, actus animales. The latter are actions of the natural man, “psychikos anthroopos,” 1st Corinthians 2:24 and have for their subject matters pertaining to sense perception, and upon which the cognitive power on man, anima, seizes by its natural force, and which affect the natural will and intellect of man as other natural perceptions do. By means of such perceptions unconverted man is able, through a natural process of reasoning, to formulate judgments and by a natural resolve to
incline His will even toward God and divine matters. He can by nature know God, because he is by natural evidence convinced of His existence; he can recognize the qualities of the Deity, to a certain extent acknowledge His duty of worshipping God and adopt a certain mode of worship. With these actus animales of an unconverted person are numbered a class of apparently religious acts, which, in persons who have reached the age of discretion, are necessary for their conversion. The natural man can physically place himself within reach of the means whereby conversion is effected and can also exercise his natural faculties of mind upon the same. Instances of such acts are the hunger and thirst after the Word of the Lord mentioned in Amos 8:11, the pleasure which Herod received from the preaching of the Baptist, Mark 6:20, the people of Nazareth, from that of Christ, Luke 4:16, 22; the credence which the Samaritans gave to the woman’s report, John 4:39, the desire of Sergius Paulus to hear Paul and Barnabas, Acts 13:7, the religious excitement at Antioch in Pisidia, Acts 13:44, the consternation of Felix, Acts 24:25, and of Agrippa, Acts 26:26ff. Such acts have been variously named by our theologians, actus paedagogici, actiones ecclesiasticae, actiones ecclesiasticae externae, actiones sacrae externae. Their chief characteristics are a conviction of man’s sinful state and helpless condition under the divine wrath, by the Law, and a logical and historical understanding of the contents of the Gospel. These actions all lie on the hither side of that invisible line, which divides the unconverted from the conversed state, and which is passed in the moment that saving faith is proclaimed in man. The question now is: What is the relation of these natural religious acts to conversion, and what is their value, especially that of contrition, which is the first and indispensable part of repentance? Man, no doubt, is approached by the Spirit of God before he is conscious of it or yields to the Spirit. Those acts which precede the procreation of faith, though they to the occur in natural man, are made useful and salutary sinner by the terminus ad quem toward which the Spirit employs them. Adam Osiander replies to an objection: “Contrition cannot be salutary in itself, because it occurs also in those who despair, yea, even in devils, James 2, hence it cannot possess the character of a means of salvation, because repentance is salutary in its entirety.” His reply is as follows: “Contrition is viewed in two ways: precisely considered, it is not a part of salutary repentance, but as a part of repentance it is salutary, because it is tempered with the hope of victory in the strife and will trust in the divine favor.” Quenstedt remarks: “A thing can be in its nature ‘meson’, i.e., indifferent, and yet can at length become salutary by a certain manner of using it. Accordingly, contrition is not by its very nature salutary, because it constitutes a part of repentance.” Kromayer: “The operation of God must be distinguished from an accidental effect which Satan and our flesh may introduce. Contrition is in itself, indeed, a work of the Holy Ghost, and not sin; accidentally, however, by reason of our innate corruption it is a murmuring against God and a way to despair. Just as a servant’s fear is not bad in itself, although it may occur in bad men, so contrition is not bad in itself, but it occurs in bad men. Still although man’s flight from God and murmuring against Him are not essential to contrition, but are super-induced as accidentals, nevertheless, they are found in the subject of contrition, i.e., in sinful man. In a word: outwardly they pertain to the form, inwardly to the subject of contrition.” The same author remarks: “Contrition precedes justification, and is not found in a person already
pleasing to God, but in a person, who is still in a state of wrath, and it occurs before saving faith, which apprehends the merit of Christ.” Contrition, then, occurs in the natural man, but it is not in the power of the natural man to render contrition salutary to himself. It becomes salutary by faith which the Holy Ghost works in contrition.
Our Confessors speak of this matter thus: “This office…. is not in us,” Smalcald Articles, Part Third, Article III, §1-45, Jacobs, pages 323-329. Apology (German text): “Darueber so lehren… traeumen,” page 168; “Wenn wir aber de contritione…. gestraft wird,” page 171; “In denselbigen Aengsten… Gesetz predigen?” page 171.

§145. Conversion Purely the Work of God.

Conversion occurs in man, yet is not of man. This is proven by two classes of Scripture passages: 1) those which show that to believe and to be regenerate or converted are identical expressions; 2) those which represent God as the cause of man’s faith. The argument based on the second class of passages is strengthened by that class of passages which describe both the inability and the hostile attitude of the unregenerate towards matters spiritual. From these premises the conclusion is inevitable that conversion is received, suffered, not enacted or produced by the unregenerate. Man is no more than the passive subject of his own conversion.
And yet conversion or the first exercise of faith implies that the intellect and will of man have begun to act, have grasped truths and have made a choice. God addresses His efforts to these faculties; the ministration of the Gospel deals with man as a rational being. From this fact it has been argued that there is in man a certain aptitude or capacity for conversion. This aptitude has been divided into “hikanotäs energätikä,” an operative or effective capacity, and “dynamis pathätikä,” a susceptible capacity. Synergism has adopted both terms, the grosser faction the former, the milder the latter. The Lutheran Church has denied both. It does not deny indeed that man is susceptible, but it denies to this susceptibility the quality of being a force or power. Man is, indeed, different from a block of stone, in so far as a block of stone has no intelligence or will, and by its very nature cannot become a subject of conversion. But the intelligence and will of man are not aids to conversion, but must themselves be converted. Their natural attitude is only hostile to conversion, and the removal of this hostility, the cessation of resistance is itself a work of grace and belongs to the form of conversion. Natural man is not able of his own strength to refrain from resistance. He cannot force himself to will what his own will compels him not to will. So soon as there is in man a faculty of applying himself to the grace of God offered him, so soon he is converted. For the presence of this faculty constitutes him a spiritual being, a new creature. Every faculty in man is known only by its activity. We may logically distinguish between the faculty to know and will and the act of knowing and willing, but this distinction has no existence in actual fact. Man is able to will only when actually willing; and that previous distinction has no existence, again, for the grace of God works both at the same time, the ability to will and very act of willing. Philippians 2:13 (“It is God who worketh in you… to will,” “to thelein”) asserts that God is the Author of man’s act of willing, which includes, of course, man’s ability to will. This distinction is a synergistic symptom: it
converts a middle state between the unconverted and the converted state, and makes conversion in the strict sense a prognosive act. According to this distinction the sinner passes from the carnal state into a semi-spiritual state, and thence into a spiritual state. Natural man, they say, given a certain spiritual capacity by means of which he is placed in a certain position to decide for himself in favor of the Gospel, by that decision thus passes over into the third state and is converted. His conversion thus is his own act performed by the aid of God’s grace. Of such an intermediary state, Scripture does not speak anywhere. Nor does Scripture recognize in the work of a sinner’s conversion a distinction as regards the degrees of resistance. While it is certainly true that there are degrees and while Scripture even introduces resistance in the form of very pronounced hostility to the offer of grace, Scripture does not offer this as an explanation why one sinner is converted rather than another. Hence the distinction between malicious and natural resistance, when employed to explain the conversion of a particular sinner is also a synergistic symptom. Scripture in Hosea 13:9 ascribes an effect to man’s resistance, only one effect, and that a destructive or negative one; but it ascribes no effect to man’s non-resistance, yea, it does not recognize such an attitude.
A two-fold difficulty arises to the natural mind from this presentation; viz., either man’s intellect and will are crushed in conversion by an irresistible power, and man is thus converted against his will, or he remains unconcerned and unconscious of what is being done with him, and man is thus converted without his will. Both statements rest on an unscriptural deduction. From the statement that the carnal mind is enmity against God, Romans 8:7, and lusteth against the Spirit, Galatians 5:17, and that the converted believe according to the working of God’s almighty power, Ephesians 1:19, it does not follow that the carnal mind is forced into submission, which is sullen, so that it believes and remains hostile, which would be contradictio in adiecto, but if anything follows, it is this, that the carnal mind in conversion surrenders to the mighty power which has drawn it, John 17:8, and has so drawn it, as to make out of an unwilling mind a willing one. Hence while man’s natural will is overcome in conversion, man is not angry in his conversion but rejoices over it, because this defeat brings him the spiritual freedom. He acknowledges the greater power of God, but he acknowledges two features of that power: 1) that it was the power of love in Christ, hence a winning, endearing power, and 2) that it was resistible though it was just as great as the power which created the world. For daily experience shows that it is resisted, and the sinner is conscious of such resistance, even after his conversion. Again, from the statement that “God grants repentance” and “gives the gift of faith,” Acts 11:17, 18, that Jesus is the Author and Finisher of faith, Hebrews 12:2, that God shines into the heart to give the light of knowledge, 2nd Corinthians 4:6, it does not follow that the heart is in a dormant state while these events take place, and that conversion occurs while man is indifferent to it. On the contrary, God has so ordered the form, and appointed such means of conversion as to enlist the activity of the heart. For He engages the sinner’s natural attention by means of His Word and by that same means quickens the heart and conveys knowledge of and affection for what the Word proposes. Passiveness in conversion, then, is not the same as unconsciousness or indifference. The sinner is passive for this reason, that he contributes nothing out of his own strength
towards his conversion, but God effects the entire conversion alone, and the sinner suffers it, however, he suffers it knowingly and willingly, receives it with joy. Formula of Concord, “Solid Declaration,” Chapter II, §6, 7, 53, 54, Jacobs, pages 552, 562f.

§146. Act of Faith.

All the acts of applying grace (gratia applicatrix [sic]) which we studied in the preceding paragraphs had faith for their objective. God calls, regenerates, converts men – this means that God makes believers out of unbelievers. The act or acts produced in regeneration, or conversion, in the intellect and will of man, are acts of faith or are faith.
Faith is in our textbook called “saving” faith, and it is briefly described as “the acceptance of the benefits of Christ.” The benefits of Christ are our salvation. The Second Article in Luther’s Small Catechism is inscribed “of Salvation.” It relates the acts of the God-man, by which our salvation was acquired outside of us by Christ. The Third Article might also have been inscribed “of Salvation,” for it tells us how the salvation procured for us becomes our own. It speaks of acts which the Holy Spirit performs in us. And these acts are all grouped around the idea of the concept of faith. “I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ my Lord, or come to Him, but the Holy Ghost has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts,” etc. Thus we can say a twofold salvation is proclaimed by the Christian religion: one by the work of Christ, the other by faith; and both are necessary. But what is the relation of the one to the other? In particular, why is faith necessary that we may be saved, if we were saved before we even believed, and independently of our believing?
The necessity of faith does not depreciate the redemption of Jesus Christ. That is a finished product. Nothing can be added to it from without to render it complete. Christ has by His work fully satisfied the demands of divine justice, or, what comes to the same thing, God is fully reconciled with all men and with each individual man through Christ. Any one who denies this, and places along side of the satisfaction, which Christ has rendered, another satisfaction, which man is to make, to render the satisfaction of Christ valid and complete, teaches unbiblical doctrine. Nevertheless, it has pleased God to lay down this order: that man, in order to actually obtain possession of the salvation, which is by Jesus Christ, must believe this salvation as it is proclaimed to him in the Gospel. Any person who disbelieves the salvation which Christ effected for him, is lost in spite of the salvation of Christ.
Accordingly, we lay stress, on the one hand, on the completeness and sufficiency of the salvation which is by Jesus Christ. The sects usually view this salvation thus: Christ has by His living and dying accomplished this much, that God is inclined to forgive men their sins, provided they change their lives by conversion. This is false. God has been perfectly reconciled with man by the work of Christ, and expresses the fact of His gracious attitude to man in the Gospel.
On the other hand, we lay stress on faith, because only by faith can the declaration which God makes in the Gospel be accepted. It is not by the act of man’s faith, that God is moved to be gracious. When Christ died God was reconciled with all men. Evan at that time God absolved all men from their sins. When Christ rose from the dead, all the world was actually
justified in the sight of God. This is called the objective justification. The account of this justification lies before us in the Gospel, which tells each individual sinner: God is at peace with thee! Accepting this message, the sinner is personally justified (subjective justification). Hence to believe the Gospel means to accept the salvation which Christ effected. On this teaching the entire doctrine of absolution rests: We absolve men, because we know God has absolved them.
Luther speaks out clearly and emphatically in this point: “It is not because of our doings, nor can it be merited by our works; it is all ready and given and presented to you. You must only open your mouth, or rather your heart, hold still and let God fill it, Psalm 81:11. This cannot be done otherwise than by believing His Word,” XI, 1489. This gives the proper scope and meaning of faith. Faith does not create our absolution, does not draw the forgiveness of sin to us. The forgiveness of sin is rather brought directly to us in the Gospel, and faith takes what the Gospel gives. Calov illustrates the relation of faith to the redemption of Christ by a comparison. Suppose, somebody has paid the ransom for a number of captives, and has ordered the door of their prison to be thrown open, and the announcement made to the prisoners that they are free and may quit their cells. They have all been made free. But only those actually become free, who credit the announcement and come forth.
Hence it would not be in accordance with the facts to call faith the condition of salvation. We have been redeemed and reconciled absolutely, “simpliciter, perfectissime, plenissime, quantum ad meritum et acquisitionem.” A distinction is thus made between the acquisition and the application of salvation. Faith is necessary for the latter only. It is of the highest importance that we regard our redemption as completed; for if this is not done, faith will always come to appear and be regarded as a work which man must perform, in order to perfect his salvation. The correct view of faith is that it is the act of acceptance, “nihil aliud est quam proprius illius expiationis et satisfactionis et reconciliationis Christi,” Quenstedt. Faith does no more than receive. “Receiving” and “believing” are plainly synonyms, John 1:12, 16; 7:8; Acts 10:43; 26:18. Yea, in Colossians 2:6 the force of the term “believe” has passed over to that of “receive.”
This is the second of the three meanings which faith, according to Gerhard, can have in the Scriptures. He distinguishes 1) fides activa, which is equivalent to truth and faithfulness or sincerity, e.g., Psalm 33:4. 2) fides passiva, so called because man is passive and a mere recipient in this faith. It is the faith by which he appropriates the blessing of the Gospel, John 5:46; Galatians 2:16; 3) fides obiectiva, which is the same as the doctrine, or teaching, that we are justified by faith, Galatians 1:23. The question now is, What are the contents of an act of that kind, by which the sinner appropriates the redemption of Christ? Agreeably to a time-honored usage in the Church our textbook names three aspects or phases of saving faith. These aspects are gleaned from Scripture. It is by observing the manner by which Scripture speaks of that act by which the sinner appropriates the benefits of Christ, that we learn to distinguish various elements contained in that act. Through the Gospel and the Gospel ordinances the Holy Spirit addresses His offer of salvation to the intellect and will of man, and an act of faith is executed in and through both these faculties by the sinner. In other words, in order to be a genuine act of faith, the intellect must do something, and the will must do something. Both must be active.
The intellect embraces the power to know and to pass judgment on a matter. In so far as the intellect performs these acts, faith is knowledge. Knowledge is an essential element of faith, so much so, that prior to knowledge there can be no faith and the limits of our knowledge are at the same time the limits of our faith. Only that can be believed what has been received into our intelligence and has been understood. Faith is exhibited as knowledge, Luke 1:77, “gnoosis sootärias”; Isaiah 53:11, “bedahto,” “by his knowledge,” i.e., notitia sui, knowledge of Him; John 17:3, “hina ginooskoosin se”; 2nd Peter 1:3, “dia täs epignooseoos.” The knowledge of faith is a knowledge on the basis of divine revelation, not on the basis of the principles of reason. Hence the Papists only create confusion when they cast up the question: How can a person believe things which surpass and exceed all human capacity to know and understand? True, the materials of faith are transcendental, but they are laid down before us in God’s Word and only on the authority of the Word they are known and apprehended and comprehended.
The knowledge of faith, nevertheless, is a knowledge of facts, not of the manner of those facts. Faith knows the quid, not the quo modo, the “ti,” not the “poos.” It is a criterion of rationalizing to inquire after the “Ooos.” “Saphäs täs apistias elenchos estin, to poos peri theou dzätein.” Any person who makes faith dependent, like Zacharias, on his understanding, “How can these things be?” is not a believer but an unbeliever. The knowledge of faith is in every case, and must be, a prior knowledge. We know these things which our faith grasps, because God has told them and His Book records them. As soon as a person makes his acceptance of the facts of faith dependent upon his own research or personal experience, his knowledge becomes a posteriori knowledge. His own reason – not God and His Word – determines for him the materials of faith. The school of Frank in Germany holds that faith means to accept intelligently what has become approved and verified to the inner consciousness, to the heart of the individual. We might call this a philosophy of experience, or a study in psychology, but not faith. And the idea is seen to be absurd so soon as we apply it to particular instances. Take, e.g., the Trinity. Can any person believe the Trinity by actually experiencing it in his heart? Or think of the agony of the Redeemer in the Garden and the derelictio magna on the cross. Can we have a positive knowledge of this so that we can say: “I believe it, because I have lived these events ever in my heart?”
The knowledge of faith is said to be explicita not implicita. This distinction is necessary over against the Roman Church, which admits a fides implicita, which Luther has drastically described in his “Warnungsschrift an die zu Frankfurt am Main,” in 1533. He relates: “Also sagen auch jetzt die Papisten, sie glaeuben was die Kirche glaeubt; and wie man von den Polen sagt, dass sie sagen sollen: ‘Ich glaeube was mein Koenig glaeubt’. Warum nicht? Wie koennte ein besserer Glaube sein, der weniger Kuehe und Sorge haette, denn dieser? Also sagt man, wie ein Doktor habe einen Koehler zu Prag an der Bruecken aus Mitleiden, als ueber einen armen Laien gefragt: ‘Lieber Mann, was glaubst du’? Der Koehler antwortet: ‘Das die Kirche glaubt’. Der Doktor: ‘Was glaubt denn die Kirche’? Der Koehler: ‘Das ich glaube’. Darnach, da der Doktor hat sollen sterben, ist er vom Teufel so hart angefochten im Glauben, dass er nirgend hat koennen bleiben, noch Ruhe haben, bis dass er sprach: ‘Ich glaube, das der Koehler glaubt’. Wie man auch von dem grossen Thoma Aquino
sagt, dass er an seinem Ende vor dem Teufel nicht hat bleiben koennen, bis dass er sprach: ‘Ich glaube, was in diesem Buche steht’ und dabei hatte die Bibel in Armen. Aber Gott verleihe uns solches Glaubens nicht viel. Denn wo diese nicht anders haben, denn also geglaubt, so hat sich beide Doktor und Koehler in Abgrund der Hoellen hinein geglaubt. Da hinein geglaubt auch solche Geister, die da sagen: ‘Glauben der Leib, den Christus meinet, das ist genug’. O ja, es ist fein und wohl geglaubt; solcher Glaube schadet dem Teufel nichts,” XVII, 2442. From this anecdote of Luther this fides implicita of the Papists has also been called fides carbonaria, collier’s faith (fuller’s faith). Quenstedt attacks Bellarmine on the thesis “fidem non tam per notitiam, quam per ignorantiam esse definiendum,” P. II, c. 85, 2, q. 1, f. 1345. Kromayer raises this charge against the Papists: “Testatur communis praxis in ecclesia papistica, dum fidem implicitam laudant in laicis, quando credunt sine notitia rei explicita, quod ecclesia et praelati credunt, qualis fides tollit ipsam religionem, quae sine notitia esse nequit,” Theologia positivo-polemica, I, 655.
But do not we also speak of implicit faith, and do we not teach a growth in knowledge, hence in faith? Yes, the term fides implicita can be employed, not only sensu cacodoxo [………, cacodoxy] as with the Papists, but also sensu sano. Spiritual matters are often known only in a general way. E.g., whosoever accepts the Scripture as God’s truth, accepts eo ipso all its contents, although, for the time being and at some particular moment, he may not have a full, exact, detailed, minute knowledge of every part and particle, iota and tittle of the Scriptures. As a rule, the lay knowledge of faith is a knowledge of fundamentals. There may be a practical ignorance of certain facts of Scripture (e.g. communicatio idiomatum) and yet there may be faith, true faith. This is shown so soon as these unknown facts are exhibited. Then the layman does not contradict or deny them, but accepts them forthwith as parts of the faith he has always held. And in this way, too, our knowledge increases. There is always a notitia explicita to begin with. What the real knowledge of this knowledge is, we shall hear at the end of this chapter. Along side of this notitia explicita there is a notitia implicita, which, however, becomes notitia explicita, too, through our constant searching of the Scriptures. In a sense, there will always be an element of notitia implicita in our faith, according to the apostle’s statement [1st Corinthians 13:9]: “ek merous ginooskomen.” But this refers to the “poos,” not the “ti” of the materials of faith. Not to know what one can know from Scripture is a disgrace.
What we attack then in the Papists’ position on the fides carbonaria is that they set up the authority of the Church, the prelates, the pope, the traditions above the Word of God, and that they teach men to rest easy even if they possess very little spiritual knowledge provided they confide only implicitly with childlike trust in their “holy mother church.” “This “childlike trust” we would call childish folly, and the whole scheme of the Roman hierarchy is in our view a plain confidence game. When we thus assert that the knowledge of faith requires that a person regard as true what God has revealed in Scripture, we proclaim a most practical fact, not a theory. Genuine faith regards somethings as true on the basis of Holy Writ by the operations of the Holy Spirit who works in men by means of God’s Word. We may regard something as true on reasonable grounds, but that is not faith. We do indeed employ our reason for producing an act of faith, but that is fides humana. Reason may tell a person that he ought to go to church or read the
Bible, before that person has begun to know Christ savingly. Fides humana forms no object in saving faith. In apologetics reasonable grounds are presented for the Christian’s faith. These arguments must not be regarded as necessary supports of the Christian’s faith. The Christian believes things, because Scripture presents them for his belief, not because historical or scientific arguments convince him that the thing is so.
Another element, which Scripture makes prominent in an act of faith is approval. The benefits of Christ are known in saving faith, not only as they relate to the entire sinner world, but chiefly as they relate to the believing individual. Our dogmaticians have termed this faith fides specialis, and have said that through it alone there is effected a real appropriation of the merits of Christ’s redemption. It is possible to conceive of a case where a person believes that Christ has redeemed the whole world, and yet fails to apply this general truth to himself. Such cases are not even rare (fides generalis). Fact is, that the devils believe the ministry of the redemption of mankind, yet are not saved by such belief.
It has been argued, that if we teach saving faith must always be personal faith, fides specialis, and that without such faith, the redemption of Christ proves actually futile, we destroy the universality of Christ’s redemption. This argument has already been answered by the illustration from Calov (the proclamation of amnesty to prisoners) and by the distinction which we noted between the acquisition and the appropriation of salvation. The acquisition is for all, even though the appropriation is not effected by all.
But we have another interest in teaching the universality of redemption, while we insist at the same time that saving faith must be fides specialis. The interest is this: The Bible nowhere names individuals that are saved, but always speaks of the world, of mankind, of sinners, of all, as saved by Christ. These statements are known in dogmatics as propositiones universales. God grants to the individual sinner in the moment of his conversion a personal faith, and that personal faith assures the sinner of his individual redemption. The sinner has a taste and an inward experience of the grace of God that was manifested for him. But this feeling or expression does not always exist in believers. There are seasons when the sinner is without a special, perceptible feeling of the grace of God. In trials and afflictions of faith, the inward sensation of being and knowing oneself to be a believer cease. In such seasons there is no relief possible except by a recourse to the propositiones generales, from which saving faith was derived in the first instance. We must tell the afflicted Christian that God has chosen the surest way for telling the individual sinner that he is saved, when He published the fact that all are saved. For suppose that God had published the names of individuals, how were the individuals to know that there was not somewhere or had not lived at some time a person bearing exactly the same name? Therefore, we make very much of the propositiones generales and are personally, individually grateful for them. And we would not have them in any way reduced or limited. E.g., if instead of saying: All men are saved, Scripture would say: All men are saved except one, and would not publish the name of that particular individual, every body would have to fear that he might be that individual, and the statement, all are saved, would be practically destroyed by that one unexplained exception. Another interest which we have in the propositiones generales, is the very work for which you, my young friends, are
preparing. Who could wish, who could dare to be a minister, if he could not preach a universal redemption?
However, while fully and heartily endorsing the propositiones universales, we nevertheless insist and must insist on the fides specialis. The fides specialis is not faith in a special revelation made to a particular person, but it is that faith, which specializes and personally applies the redemption proclaimed for all. In fides specialis the believer takes this stand, that Christ has come into the world for him, yea, that if He had not come for any other person, He would have come for him. Luther has injected the fides specialis by one of his master strokes into the Apostles’ Creed. His exposition of the three articles is not a dry dogmatical series of doctrinal items, but a lively profession of faith from beginning to end. The personal pronouns “I” and “me” govern the whole explanation. That is, no doubt, why not a few Christians use Luther’s explanation of the Creed as their morning and evening prayer.
A fides specialis was professed by Job, when he said: “I know that my Redeemer liveth,” and by Paul, when he wrote: “The life, which I now live… I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (Job 19:26; Galatians 2:20).
The general Gospel call in Mark 1:15 is a call to such faith. And the emotions of joy, Luke 8:13, of meekness, James 1:21, the recollection of the disciples that certain words were spoken to them and their acceptance of them, John 2:22, the reception which the Samaritans gave to the teachings of the apostles, after they had personally listened to them, Acts 8:14, indicate this stage of faith, by which the sinner gives a glad and satisfied assent to what he knows the Gospel offers to all. Assensus fidei and the fides specialis are the same thing according to Baier, 3, 140.
Chemnitz says: “Est fides quaedam generalis, quae complectitur in genere historicam notitiam eorum, quae in Scriptura a Deo proposita sunt, et generalem assensionem, qua statuimus, ea, quae in verbo Dei nobis revelata sunt, vera esse, non propter argumenta rationis, sed quia certi sumus, a Deo, qui verax et omnipotens est, illa tradita et proposita esse. Et haec quidem generalis fides, quia etiam in impiis esse potest, per se non iustificat; fides tamen iustificans generalem illam fidem praesupponit et includit.” This remark shows that when we deny the saving power of fides generalis, we by no means wish to depreciate its value and importance otherwise. The knowledge and assent of faith, the older dogmaticians have, as a rule, assigned to the intellect. Now, strictly speaking, there is no act of the intellect that does not imply an act of the will. What the dogmaticians mean to say is simply this, that in saving faith the believer first mentally receives the facts of the redemption of Christ and recognizes mentally that they apply to him.
But there is a phase of saving faith that is located entirely in the will. This is called fiducia, reliance, trust, confidence. In this act “voluntas acquiescit in Christo mediatore, tamquam bono praesente atque et causa alterius boni, nempe remissionis peccatorum et vitae aeternae consequendae,” Baier. That confidence is of the essence of faith necessarily follows from the character of the Gospel. The Gospel is not merely a historical account for the information of sinners and for their “nuda et speculativa cognitio,” Baier, but an offer of peace for the sinner’s assurance and rest. The
Papists have changed the contents of the Gospel; accordingly, they deny that fiducia belongs to saving faith.
In confidence, or trust, the believer regards Christ as a “bonum praesens.” Confidence differs from hope in this respect that hope has to do with future blessings, while confidence in a believer is the certainty that he has forgiveness now. But how can Christ be a present good? Through the Word of the Gospel. Wherever the Gospel is, there is salvation, also in the remotest solitude or wilderness. Paul states in Romans 10 that the Word is nigh unto us, even in our heart and mouth. Any Gospel passage, which declares the redemption of Christ, even when the believer merely thinks of it, makes the salvation which Christ has procured a present blessing, in which the heart trustingly acquiesces. In the same manner the people of the O. T., prior to the coming of the Messiah, had Christ present to their faith and found rest and peace in Him; yea, our first parents in Paradise had Christ brought very near to them by the first Gospel-promise, and believing that promise they were quieted and comforted in their sorrow and ultimately saved. Therefore, Christ is said to be the same yesterday, today and forever.
Again fiducia makes the blessings of Christ ours. Fiducia emphasizes two facts: 1) that the merits of Christ were procured for us, and 2) that they are offered to us; and acting upon this double fact, actually making these merits our own, as truly and really as if we ourselves had wrought them.
Fiducia, accordingly, differs from love. Love has Christ for its object, in so far as He is recognized absolutely; fiducia, in so far as He is recognized as a cause of great blessings to be derived from Him. Love wants to take nothing from Christ, but give to Christ, surrender itself, sacrifice itself for Christ; but fiducia wants to take from Christ, viz., salvation. This helps us to understand why love cannot justify the sinner, while faith does. And fiducia justifies and saves only in so far and because it obtains of Christ the forgiveness of sins and everlasting life. Confidence, of course, obtains all other blessings from God for Christ’s sake. E.g., that we are protected during the night, that our health is preserved, our business prospers, that we are being daily sanctified, are blessings secured for us by and granted us for Christ’s sake. We could not be safe five minutes amid the perils of this present life, if Christ had not secured the divine favor for us. It is useless to speak to unregenerate persons about divine protection and help. But in so far as faith, fiducia, obtains these blessings, it is not saving or justifying faith. Saving faith has to do with one object alone, that is the salvation wrought out by Jesus Chris. If we would make our daily renewal and our holy conduct grace, we would admit a strange and dangerous element to saving faith. There would then be something that saves, which would not be Christ.
In view of these facts Seb. Schmidt was right when he wrote: “Fiducia vel fiducialis apprehensio est fidei iustificantis in hoc iustificationis negotio propria et ultimate, ut sic loquar, eam constituit; unde etiam D. Hoepfnerus [Dr. Heinrich Höpfner]… eam fidei salvificae formam, et quidem intrinsiam et essentialem, dicere non dubitavit,” “Articulorum Formulae Concordiae repetitio: in alma Argentoratensium Universitate dissertationibus theologicis publici & solennis exercitij causa propositis” (Argentorati: Sumptibus & typis Josiae Staedelii, 1696), pagina 229.
Saving faith is represented as fiducia e.g., in 2nd Corinthians 3:4; 2nd Timothy 1:12; Mark 4:30. It is expressed in Scripture by “pisteuein eis” or “pisteueinä epi” with the
dative, and in ecclesiastical parlance by “believing in.” All these acts are equivalent to apprehendere, velle et accipere, velle accipere.
The chief characteristic of faith is confidence in the atoning work of Christ. Christ, Christ’s blood, Christ’s name, Christ’s Messiahship are for this season named as the objects of faith. (See passages under 4. in Outlines, page 187f.) This is also proven from the etymology of “pistis,” which is derived from “peithoo.” “Pistis” is the trustful “pepoithäsis” of the heart, which relies on the power of Jesus’ name, on the efficacy of His Word. This is proven in the third place by the synonyms which Scripture employs for “pistis”: “pepoithäsis,” trust, 2nd Corinthians 3:4; confidence, Ephesians 3:12. “Hypostasis,” confident boasting, 2nd Corinthians 9:4; confidence, 11:17; confidence, “a confidence of the heart, subsisting firmly and immovably,” Hebrews 3:14. “Pläropheria,” being fully persuaded, Romans 4:21; confer verse 20: “enedynamoothä tä pistei”; full assurance, Colossians 2:2; in full assurance of faith, Hebrews 10:22. “Parräsia” (boldness), Ephesians 3:12; confidence, 1st John 3:21; boldness, 1st John 4:17. The opposite of faith is hesitation, Romans 4:20; James 1:6; Luke 8:50; Matthew 8:26; 14:31. Confer: “The adversaries feign…. grace in Christ,” Apology, II, §48, Jacobs, page 91; “The Gospel freely offers…. justifies us.” ibid., II §44, 45, page 90f.; “We do not exclude…. highest degree,” ibid., II, §73, page 96; “Because in repentance… fulfil God’s Law,” ibid., II, §45, page 91; “From James they cite…. devil and death,” ibid., III, §123-128, page 126f.; “For faith justifies…the promised mercy,” ibid., II, §56, page 92; “These treasures…. Word of the Gospel,” Formula of Concord, “Solid Declaration,” III, §10, 11, page 571;” As Luther writes… good works,” ibid., IV, §10, page 583f.; “For that nevertheless remains true…. Do not follow,” ibid., III, §41, 42, page 577; “The expressions of Paul that we are ‘justified by faith’, Romans 3:28, or that ‘faith is counted for righteousness’, Romans 4:5, and that we are ‘made righteous by the abundance of one’, Romans 5:19, or that ‘by the righteousness of one justification of faith came to all men’, Romans 5:18, are regarded and received as equivalents. For faith justifies not because it is so good a work and so fair a virtue, but because in the promise of the Gospel it lays hold of and accepts the merits of Christ; for if we are to be justified thereby, this must be applied and appropriated by faith. Therefore, the righteousness, which, out of pure grace, is imputed to faith or to the believer, is the obedience, suffering and resurrection of Christ, by which He has made satisfaction for us to the Law, and paid the price of our sins,” ibid., III, §12-14, page 571f.

§147. State of Faith.

Faith is viewed in Scripture as an act and as a condition. It is both a birth and a life, the rising of the day star in the hearts and the day itself, the putting on of the garments of salvation and the wearing of them etc. A state of faith is plainly indicated by such phrases as “be in the faith,” 2nd Corinthians 13:5; “to stand fast in the faith,” 1st Corinthians 16:13; “to live by faith,” Galatians 2:20; “to be established in the faith,” Acts 16:5; Colossians 2:7; “to continue in faith,” 1st Timothy 2:15; “to keep the faith,” 2nd Timothy 4:7; “to be kept through faith unto salvation,” 1st Peter 1:5. Throughout this state, faith never changes its essential qualities; its contents are ever the same. But faith changes as regards quantity and intensity. Its power
increases, 2nd Corinthians 10:15, and it may also decrease, Luke 22:32; it may be strong and bold, Ephesians 3:12; 2nd Timothy 1:12; John 6:68, 69, and it may be “oligopistia,” little faith. “Habitual faith may be described as a habit, divinely bestowed, of the intellect and will for knowing those things which have been divinely revealed and must be believed, especially regarding the Mediator Christ, and regarding the grace of God and salvation which must be obtained by Christ, also of giving assent to the same thought through and on the ground of the divine revelation, and of trustfully acquiescing in Christ, to the end of attaining the remission of sins and eternal salvation,” Baier.

§148. Justification.

Two men have been providentially guided to the discovery of the same truth in the same way. These men are Saul of Tarsus and the Augustinian friar, Martin Luther. The truth that each discovered was the correct, the divinely intended meaning of the term “dikaiosynä theou,” when used in reference to God’s dealings with sinners. And the way in which each made the discovery was by passing suddenly from the most rigid form of the most rigid ecclesiastical formalism, fanaticism, bigotry, which after all yielded the bruised conscience no abiding peace, over into the most outspoken contempt of all formalism, yet accompanied by a deep, serene peace of heart and by a very high regard for true holiness. As a young student at Gamaliel’s school Paul had created a sensation in Jerusalem by his ardent zeal in behalf of the ancient religion of Moses, which he regarded as being put in jeopardy by the rising sect of one Christ of Nazareth, whom this Paul hated with intense hatred as an impostor. Paul was a proud young Hebrew, possessed of that stubborn pride which personal uprightness, spotless integrity and the very strictest adherence to, and outward fulfilment of, ecclesiastical ordinances is apt to beget. “I am verily a man which am a Jew, born in Tarsus, a city in Cilicia, yet brought up in this city at the feet of Gamaliel, and taught according to the perfect manner of the law of the fathers, and was zealous toward God, as ye all are this day,” Acts 22:3. “Seeing that many glory after the flesh, I will glory also…. Are they Hebrews? so am I. Are they Israelites? so am I. Are they the seed of Abraham? so am I,” 2nd Corinthians 11:18, 22. Thus we hear him speak years after he had long cast this dross of secular prestige overboard. This man had gloried in the righteousness of the Law of Jehovah. He had thanked God that he was not like other men. He had been taught to hate the Christ for that saying: Verily “I say unto you, that except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven,” Matthew 5:20. Fierce resentment and displeasure had been nursed in him against the Galilean Prophet for that scathing arraignment of what he prized the finest flower of God’s earth, the sanctimonious righteousness of Jewish pharisaism. He was confident that whoever disputed his righteousness which he had by the God-given Law of Israel, and which had been preached and practiced in the elect nation for two thousand years, attacked not only the world’s most venerable institution but undermined all moral support of men, broke the staff upon which man must lean in his pilgrimage to the reward of the just. Alas, this righteous man was ignorant of what righteousness is; this zealous pupil of Moses was adoring
a fictitious law. And hence it was that he learned never to know sin, its heinousness and its full power. The Christ whom he persecuted caused the scales to drop from his eyes. “I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet. But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. For without the law sin was dead. For I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died. And the commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death. For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me. Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good. Was then that which is good made death unto me? God forbid. But sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good; that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful. For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin. For that which I do I allow not: for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that I do. If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good…. I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not. For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.” Thus speaks this righteous man after the painful ordeal through which he had passed in the seclusion of that room in Damascus; and there, far removed from the place to which the thoughts of the Jews reverted in their holy pride, we may imagine that also the wail broke for the first time from the crushed heart of this haughty son of Benjamin: “O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this” sin? Yes, the staff on which he had leaned had been shattered in his hand like a frail reed; his proud hopes had been wrecked in the very haven in which he had imagined himself securely anchored; the Law, which he had esteemed his friend, proved his enemy, or rather, the Law, to which he had believed himself a friend, he found himself hating. And now the hand, which had dashed the fictitious righteousness of Saul of Tarsus to shivers in the terror of the Law, gave to Paul, the future apostle of righteousness, the righteousness of God, without the Law. He states the result of his divine instruction thus: “Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin. But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for 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: whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; to declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? of works? Nay: but by the law of faith. Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith, without the deeds of the law.” And from the same city to which these words were sent in the Epistle to the Romans, the same Paul aged and broken, but buoyant, triumphant in spirit, writes from prison these words which sum up his life work: “We are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh. Though I might also have confidence in the flesh. If any other man
thinketh that he hath whereof he might trust in the flesh, I more: Circumcised the eighth day of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, an Hebrew of the Hebrews; as touching the law, a Pharisee; concerning zeal, persecuting the church; touching the righteousness which is in the law, blameless. But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ. Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ, and be found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith.” He exalts in having thrown away his own righteousness and in having obtained righteousness which is of God. That was the event of his life.
1500 years later a monk sat in his cell at Wittenberg in Saxony, poring over Paul’s writings. He was a truly holy monk, blameless by the laws of his order, but he was an unholy man by the verdict of his own heart. Paul’s teaching law buried deep beneath the teachings of a new pharisaism in a church, which, purporting to be the bearer of God’s saving truth, had grown wicked, wealthy and wanton. This Roman monk was privileged to find and to restore to the world, we trust, for the last time, the sinner’s valid and genuine righteousness at the tribunal of divine justice. It is worth while to hear Luther discourse on the great find which he, the miner’s son, was lead to make in the year 1519, when digging deep in the gold-mines of God’s Word. He tells the story thus: “I had, in truth, a cordial desire and longing to understand correctly St. Paul’s Epistle to the Romans, and, so far, nothing prevented me, save only that one little word ‘iustitia Dei’, the righteousness of God in the 17th verse of the first chapter, where Paul says the righteousness of God is revealed in the Gospel. I intensely hated this word, the righteousness of God, and, as was then the custom and practice of all teachers, I had not been taught and instructed otherwise than that I must understand it as the philosophers do, namely that it denoted that righteousness, by which God is righteous in Himself, performs righteous acts and punishes all sinners and impious and unrighteous persons, which righteousness is called essential (formalis) or active (activa). Now my condition was this: although I was leading the life of an holy and unblamable monk, yet I found myself a great sinner before God, and also of an anxious and disquieted conscience, having no confidence in my ability to reconcile God by my works of atonement and merits. Thus I did not at all love this righteous and angry God, who punishes sinners, but hated Him, and, (if this was no blasphemy or should be regarded as such) secretly I was angry with God in good earnest; frequently I would say: Is God not satisfied with heaping upon us poor, miserable sinners who, by virtue of original sin, have already been condemned to eternal death, all manner and misery of sorrow in this life, besides and terror and threats of the Law, and must He still increase this misery and heartache by the Gospel and by its voice and proclamation menace us still further and make known this righteousness and serious wrath? Here oftentimes I would wax hot in my confused conscience; still I continued my meditations on dear St. Paul, to ascertain what he could possible mean at this place, and I felt a hearty craving and desire to know it. With such thoughts I spent days and nights until, by the grace of God, I perceived the connection of the words, namely in this wise: The righteousness of God is revealed in the Gospel: as it is written, The just shall live by faith. Thence I have learnt to
understand that righteousness of God in which the righteous through the grace and gift of God live by faith alone, and I perceived this to be the meaning of the apostle, that by the Gospel is revealed the righteousness which is valid before God, in which God, from pure grace and mercy justifies us, which, in Latin is called iustitia passiva (passive righteousness) as it is written: The just shall live by his faith. Presently I felt that I had been entirely born anew and that I had right here found a door wide open and leading straightway into Paradise; moreover, now the dear Scriptures looked at me quite different from what they had before; accordingly, I hurriedly ran through the whole Bible, prying into as many passages as I could remember, and, according to this same rule, I collected all its interpretations also with regard to other terms; e.g., that God’s work means this: that God Himself works in us; God’s power, that by which He makes us mighty and strong; God’s wisdom, that by which He makes us wise; also other terms: The strength of God, the salvation of God, the glory of God etc. Now as much as I had before hated this term ‘righteousness of God’ in good earnest, as highly I now began to prize and esteem it, considering it the word dearest and most comforting to me, and this self-same place in St. Paul verily became to me the true gate of Paradise,” Halle XIV, 460f.
Heinrich Schmidt states in an article in Herzog and Plitt’s Encyclopedia (2nd. ed., vol. 12, p. 555): “In the course of development of the Christian Church and dogma the doctrine of justification has really formed the subject of important discussion only twice: in the apostolic age and in the age of the Reformation. And in proportion as the doctrine of justification is at these two points made the real centre of important dogmatical tendencies, it contrasts forcibly with the relative indifference with which the intervening ages treat the question.”
The thesis in our Outlines which presents the subject of justification starts out with a double reference to Christological truths. The work of Christ, and the manner in which God regards this work, are basic truths to the act by which God justifies the sinner. The fact that the sinner can be righteous before God must be understood from this fact, that the Righteous One was a sinner before God. In his grand parallel in Romans 5 where Paul contrasts Adam and Christ and the effects of the work of either upon mankind, he speaks of a twofold imputation. 1) Christ was made a sinner. Three times in close succession Isaiah states this: “The Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all,” “hiphgi bo eth avon kulanu.” Gesenius renders: He caused the guilt of us all to strike Him, to drop upon Him, as when a crushing weight strikes a person. In verse 11 the prophet says: He shall bear the iniquity of us all, “havonotham hu jisbol.” “Sabal” is used to express the motion of a burden which one bears under painful pressure. Finally, in verse 12: “He bare the sin of many,” “hu chet rabim nasa,” literally, He lifted many trespasses. The last two passages express the voluntary decision of Christ. So then, the prophet’s words conjure up a vivid scene before our mind’s eye. Panting under the severe strain of a burden Christ goes His way through this earthly life. It is as if John had seen Him thus with the physical eye, when he exclaimed: “Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world,” “airoon tän hamartian tou kosmou, John 1:29. As a convict upon whom guilt has been fastened and who dares not lift his head in the presence of upright men, so Christ appears to the inspired writers. And the imputation of guilt was not imaginary, but real, for Peter says:
“He his own self bear our sins in his own body on the tree,” “anänegkenen too soomati autou epi to xylon,” He bore them upward, as when the criminal on the day of execution climbs the ladder to the scaffold with his guilt upon him, 1st Peter 2:24. And what He carried up to that tree Peter calls “tas hamartias hämoon.” Philippi remarks: “The statement, that when Christ carried His own body up to the tree of the cross, He carried up our sins at the same time cannot be understood in any other way than that He had taken our sins upon Him by imputation and had atoned for them by His suffering the death-penalty vicariously,” IV, 2, 298. Yes, the imputation was real. “God hath made him to be sin for us,” “hamartian hyper hämoon epoiäsen. 2nd Corinthians 5:21. This statement fairly staggers the comprehension, all the more, because the Gospel assures us in the same breath, this was done to ton mä gnonta hamartian,” Him who knew no sin, who had no personal knowledge and experience of sin. John startles us with the same contrast: “Ye know that he was manifested to take away our sins, and in him is no sin,” “hamartia en autoo ouk estin,” 1st John 3:5. The sinless God a sinner, by having been made such! “Epoiäsen” cannot refer to material creation, for that which was materially created in the virgin is called “that holy thing.” “Epoiäsen” refers to the imputation, but a strong term has been chosen to express the full earnest of the text. Christ was made sin and therefore He is sin. In Him is no sin, upon Him is every sin. He has been dressed in our garments. Indutus quodam modo et vestibus fuit universum peccatorum generis humani foeditate,” says Quenstedt. This imputation of our sin to Christ has caused God to assume to Christ the same attitude that He maintains toward the sinner. God is angry at the sinner, so angry that He curses him. Wicked angels and men are called “hoi katäramenoi,” the cursed, Matthew 25:41; “kataras tekna,” cursed children, 2nd Peter 2:14, literally, children of curse, i.e. whose characteristic mark is a curse. God’s holiness has a repelling force which is exerted through His anger. And now we find Christ called “genomenos hyper hämoon katara,” the one who became a curse in our stead, Galatians 3:16. When? Where? Luther points to that moment on Calvary when Christ cries out: “Why hast thou forsaken me?” He says: “Hier ist Gott wider ihn gewest.” In those moments He tasted hell and the second death, the state of utter damnation. We have been reminded of the tree upon which He took His body and our sins. Paul rivets attention to this fact, Romans 5:6: “When we were yet without strength, in due time, Christ died for the ungodly,” “hyper aseboon.” He also tasted the first death. And a few hours before He had prayed: “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me.” It was not possible, because the imputation was not feigned but real.
It is customary to emphasize in the work of the atonement the suffering, or passive obedience of Christ. But His active obedience must not be eliminated from this work. Christ was sent “genomenon hypo nomon,” as one who had become amenable to Law, Galatians 4:4. He had not come to destroy, but to fulfil the Law. His suffering is more frequently mentioned only because His entire obedience culminated in that passion. At length His task was accomplished “Tetelestai,” He cried, John 19:30. He was taken from prison and judgment, “meozer ummishpat luqach,” Isaiah 53:8. We note the significant use of these two terms “meozer ummishpat”; they refer to a forensic process. The trial was over and Christ was taken out. He was released. Paul states the result thus: “Christ was justified in the spirit,” “edikaioothä en pneumati,” 1st
Timothy 3:16. He was pronounced just, the entire Christ who had worked here on earth was declared blameless, now that He has entered upon the new state which began for Him after the resurrection, when His “pneuma,” His divine nature, was the dominating influence in His existence.
Now bear in mind that all this was done “hyper hämoon,” for us. That means, indeed, for our benefit, however, in this way for our benefit: that it was done in our stead. The force of “hyper” dare not be weakened; else such a contrast as “dikaios hyper adikoon” loses its meaning. The effects of Christ’s work upon us are next to be observed. “Thou wast slain and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood,” Revelation 5:9, “ägorasas too theoo en too haimati sou.” “Ye were redeemed with the precious blood of Christ,” 1st Peter 1:18, “elytroothäte timioo haimati christou.” “Christ gave Himself a ransom for all,” 1st Timothy 2:6, “christos dous heauton antilytron hyper pantoon.” The language suggests liberation in a judicial process, by payment of the fine. Christ is that payment and God accepts the payment. That includes, on the part of God, the abandonment of His vindictive measures, the appeasing of His anger. Here we must note the force of the Greek “hilaskomai,” to be gracious. The publican groans: “Ho theos hilasthäti moi too hamartooloo,” God be gracious to me, sinner that I am, Luke 18:13. Of Christ we find it stated that He is a “merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people,” “eis to hilaskesthai tas hamartias tou laou,” i.e., that the sins of the people might be viewed and treated without anger, but with mercy. “Hilaskesthai” is an action which extends to “hamartias” as the object, Hebrews 2:17. John calls Christ “hilasmos peri hamartioon hämoon,” the propitiation for our sins, 1st John 2:2; and Paul says, Romans 3:25, “hon proetheto ho theos hilastärion,” whom God hath sent forth to be a propitiation. And what that means is plainly stated in chapter 5:9: “soothäsometha di’ autou apo täs orgäs,” “we shall be saved from wrath through him. That wrath, which hung lowering over our guilty heads, has been abolished. In regard to Romans 5:9, Philippi calls attention to the apostle’s syllogism: If having been justified in the blood of Jesus, we shall be spared the wrath of God, then that same blood must have saved from that wrath in the first instance as a reconciling blood. Colossians 1:20: Christ has made peace through the blood of His cross, “eiränopoiäsas dia tou haimatos tou staurou.” Yes, and the curse, too, is gone. Galatians 3:13: Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the Law, “christos hämas exägorasen ek täs kataras tou kosmou.” 2nd Corinthians 5:18: God hath reconciled us to Himself by Jesus Christ, “tou theou tou katalaxantos hämas heautoo dia christou.” Verse 19: “God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself,” “kosmon katalassoon heautoo.” “Katalassoon” we derive from “allos,” another. “Alassoo” to make somebody to be another person. “Katalassoo,” to do this thoroughly. God has entered into a different relation to us. And we find the double compound “apokatalassoo” in Ephesians 2:16 and Colossians 1:20, which signifies to restore one to his former correct relation with another.
This now is the situation which has been created since the completion of the work of Christ: the guilt of our sin is cancelled; the anger of God has been appeased. We again bask in the light and love of the benevolence of our heavenly Father. Aye, we must not shrink from saying outright that when Christ died and rose again, then and there, we and all the progeny of Adam were justified. For what else can Paul intend when he
says: “God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself,” “mä logidzomenos autois ta paraptoomata autoon,” “not imputing their trespasses unto them,” 2nd Corinthians 5:18. This participle clause explains the action expressed by the preceding “kosmon katalassoon heautoo.” God entered into another relation with the world in this wise that He refused to consider, or rather, decided not to consider (“mä logidzomenos”) their trespasses. The world had not changed its relation to God, but God had changed His relation to the world. In Romans 5:18 we are told that the death of Christ is a “dikaiooma,” a decree of justice, and this “dikaiooma” results to all men “eis dikaioosin,” unto justification. Now before we were told that Christ’s death was a “katara,” a curse; here it is a dikaiooma eis dikaioosin,” a decree for justification. Hence we are taught to regard it not only in a negative way, as the removing or canceling of guilt, but also as a positive declaration of our righteousness. God has pronounced a universal absolution on mankind. “As to the heavenly Father,” says Gerhard, “by surrendering Christ into death for our sins, condemned sin in His body by sin, or rather as He condemned, i.e., punished our sin in Christ, which had been laid upon and imputed to Him as our Substitute, so He also, by quickening Him from the dead absolved Him in that very act from our sins which had been imputed to Him and by doing that He also absolved us in Him.”
Here then the proper presentation of the justification of a sinner must set in. Christ was raised up “dia tän dikaioosin hämoon,” for our justification. “If he is not raised, ye are yet in your sins,” “eti este en tais hamartiais hymoon.” In what sense and respect, asks Gerhard, may our justification be attributed to the resurrection of Christ? He returns a threefold answer: “Because by raising Him from the dead the Father absolved Him from our sins, which had been imputed to Him, and in absolving Him absolved us in Him, so that the resurrection of Christ is the cause, the earnest and the complement of our justification.” That is his third reason. Again: “In the resurrection of Christ we have been absolved from our sins so that they can no longer condemn us in the judgment of God.” Accordingly, in the places to which we alluded before, Paul couples his justification with the resurrection of Christ: “that I may win Christ, and be found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith; that I may know him and the power of his resurrection.” Haec vis resurrectionis Christi complectitur non solum iustitiae coram Deo valentis applicationem, sed etiam actualem a peccatis absolutionem ac tandem resurrectionem,” Gerhard. For this reason Peter ascribes regeneration to the resurrection of Christ, 1st Peter 1:3, and explains the power of baptism from the same source, 1st Peter 3:21. And confessing with the mouth the Lord Jesus and believing with the heart that God has raised Him from the dead is said to justify and to save a person, Romans 10:9. The completed work of Christ is in itself a perfect justification of the sinner. It is announced as such. God hath committed unto us “logon täs katallagäs,” the word of reconciliation, the word which tells of that reconciliation, which was effected by God, who was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them, 2nd Corinthians 5:19. “Be it known,” says Paul, Acts 13:38, “that through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins,” not a forgiveness which is to take place, but that has taken place. This is the message to which sinners are asked to yield credence.
Whenever they do, what happens? God justifies them. He declares him who believes the truths stated to be a person whom He regards as just. This is expressed by the verb “dikaioun.” 38 times this term occurs in the New Testament: Matthew 11:19; 12:37; Luke 7:29, 35; 10:29; 16:15; 18:14; Acts 13:39 (twice); Romans 2:13; 3:4, 20, 24, 26, 28, 30; 4:2, 5; 5:1, 9; 6:7; 8:30, 33; 1st Corinthians 4:4, 6, 11; Galatians 2:16 (thrice), 17; 3:8, 11, 24; 5:4; 1st Timothy 3:16; Titus 3:7; James 2:21, 24, 25. Hence there is abundant material at hand to fix its true meaning The strife of Luther with the Church of Rome has chiefly turned upon this term and its meaning. It denotes, not to infuse righteousness, but to pronounce righteous. Its contrary is “to be judged,” John 3:18, “to come into the judgment,” John 5:24. It occurs “doorean tä autou chariti,” “freely by his grace,” Romans 3:24. But in the same passage another cause is stated, “dia täs apolytrooseoos täs en christoo Iäsou,” on account of the redemption, which is in Jesus Christ. This, we heard, effected a judgment of righteousness for the world. What God decreed to the world in the resurrection of Christ, that He declares the possession of the individual in the moment a person believes. God made Him, who knew no sin, to be sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him, 2nd Corinthians 5:21. This is that righteousness which Paul, Philippians 3:9, places opposite to his own, and which he calls “tän dia pisteoos christou tän ek theou dikaiosynän.”
One question remains: How is faith to be viewed in this act? In Romans 4:5 Paul says: “To him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.” Here “ergadzesthai” and “pisteuein” are contrary. Now “pisteuein” is a work and is otherwise so called in Scripture. A faith that is not active is no faith at all. Also in justification faith is active, knowing, asserting, trusting, receiving etc. But it is not these qualities that are considered in justification, because justification looks not at all at what is going on in the sinner, or what the sinner is become, but only at what the sinner embraces, lays hold of. That is the righteousness of Christ. Upon that, as held by his faith, but not because of its being held by faith, the sinner is justified. Justifying faith is regarded apart from its qualities. If faith were considered in its activity, it must be viewed as a virtue. As such it belongs into the Law. As such it is excluded from the act of justification. The exclusive basis for the decree of God: This man is righteous, is Christ’s work. Hence “pistis” and “haima christou” or “christos” are synonyms in justification. Romans 4:5: “To him… that believeth… his faith is counted for righteousness” means: his Christ, whom he has by faith. Romans 3:22: “The righteousness of God is by faith in Christ Jesus upon all who believe” means – is by the received or believed Christ upon all those etc. This view removes the question which has perplexed some: Which is first, faith or the justifying act of God? Answer: neither. If faith precedes the justifying act, that act is performed on account of it; if the justifying act precedes, it occurs without faith. Both are contemporaneous. Faith and justification coincide, just as two eyes meet in a glance. “Tempore simul sunt actus, quo homini confertur fides, et actus, quo homo iustificatur; licet ille natura prior sit, hic posterior,” Baier, III, 246. The justifying act does not start with an examination of the faith of the applicant for justification, and then proceeds to handing over to the believer the gift which he is seeking. But it is simply the acknowledgment that the sinner has what justifies him.

§149. Consequences of Justification.

The question now is: what is the condition of a sinner now that God has pronounced the sentence of absolution upon him? The justifying act does not take place in the sinner, but there are effects of the act of which the sinner becomes conscious: 1) his standing with God has been changed. God no longer reproaches him on account of his sins. He has “peace with God,” “eiränän pros ton theon,” Romans 5:1. The apostle names the justified as possessors of this peace (“echomen”); it is not the peace which God possesses in Himself, but which the justified sinners experience as an effect of this justification, “dikaioothentes.” Whether this aorist participle is rendered by a temporal or by a causal clause, the peace which the apostle predicates is both post hoc and propter hoc. This peace rests on the foundation of Christ’s work (dia tou kyriou hämoon,” etc.). Christ is the Author of it. The Father, having made peace through the blood of His cross now reconciles all to Himself through Him, Colossians 1:20. Christ has removed the cause for division between God and the sinner, turned the loving face of God towards the sinner and inclined God’s ears to the sinner’s prayer, Isaiah 59:2. In Him peace is dispensed to the weary and heavy laden. 2) This peace guards or secures the hearts and minds of the justified (“phrouräsei tas kardias hymoon kai ta noämata hymoon”), Philippians 4:7. The heart quiets the slavish fear of God. The justified calm their conscience whenever it cites the record of their sin to them. That record has been cancelled, Colossians 2:14. The Law and the conscience can present no true bill of indictment against the justified, Romans 8:1, 34. Hence the “pneuma douleias eis phobon,” “the spirit of bondage unto fear,” Romans 8:15 is gone from the justified, and a “pneuma hyiothesias,” a spirit of adoption has entered. “Pneuma” in this place is the “pneuma” of man, not of God, and the genitive is the genitive of quality, spiritus qualis est servorum, qualis est adoptatorum. Luther: “Knechtischer Geist, kindlicher Geist.” (It is a mistake to print the second “spirit” in Romans 8:15 with a capital letter, as the Authorized, not the Revised, Version does.) The justified being no longer afraid of God as of their avenging Judge, but viewing Him as their Father, claim children’s rights with God; they address Him: Abba, Father, in terms of endearment and trustful confidence, knowing that they have access “prosagoogän,” Romans 5:1; Ephesians 3:12 to God, that the door is not locked against them. And this they do with boldness, “parräsia,” Ephesians 3:12, undaunted by any compunctions and with joy in God, “kauchoomenoi en too theoo,” Romans 5:1, glorifying in this God who has reconciled them to Him and now receives sinners. The foundation of this child-like trust, boldness and joy is the atonement of Christ, Romans 5:11. (Confer Romans 5:1, “di’ hou prosagoogän eschäkamen.”) Christ came to redeem them that are under the Law, “that we might receive the adoption of sons.”
3) The peace of the justified makes content in the sorrows of the present life, “working patience” in suffering. Earthly afflictions have lost their vindictive character to the justified. He is assured of the divine favor in spite of them, and defeats their grievous features by the prospect of the glory beyond, of which Christ has made him heir, Titus 3:7; Romans 5:21, and to the end of attaining which he was justified, this being a link in the divine chain of predestination, Romans 8:30.
It is in a twofold sense a peace of the cross: it follows from the cross of Christ, and enables the justified to bear the cross for Christ without murmuring and pining. The justified then are certain of their justification and eternal salvation. Romanism denies this on the ground that no sinner can be certain that he may not fall from grace. It makes doubt an essential part of faith. So did Latermann. We note against this monstrous teaching, that the certainty of Christians rests not on a knowledge of God’s secret counsels, but on His statement in His revealed Word, not on God’s demands in the Law, but on His promises in the Gospel. Not to be sure under these conditions means to deny the veracity of God, the validity of Christ’s atonement and the reliability of the offer of the Gospel. Besides it is a contradiction of the essence of faith to make doubt a part of it. Luther: “Granted, that all were well in popery, still that monstrous teaching of uncertainty surpasses all their other monstrosities, and although it is plain to them, that it is only enemies of Christ who teach such uncertainty, because they enjoin consciences to doubt, they are nevertheless so filled with Satanic rage that in their supreme security they condemn and kill us as heretics, because we dissent from them by teaching certainty, just as if they were most certain of their teaching. Let us, therefore, thank God that we have been delivered from the minister of uncertainty, and are able now to state for a certainty that the Holy Spirit is crying in our hearts and uttering His unutterable groaning; and this is the foundation of our teaching: The Gospel orders us to look not at our own good deeds and perfection, but at God Himself who is issuing promises to us, yea, at Christ, the Mediator. The pope, on the contrary, commands us not to look to God who makes promises to us, not to Christ, our high priest, but to our own works and merits. Here doubt and despair must necessarily follow, while on the former ground there is certainty and joy of the Spirit, because I cling to God, who cannot lie. For He says: Behold, I deliver my Son into death, in order that by His blood He may redeem thee from sins and death. Here I cannot doubt, unless I should flatly want to deny God. And this is the reason why our theology is certain, because it snatches us away from the consideration of ourselves, so that we rely not on our strength, conscience, sense, person or works, but on that which is outside of ourselves, namely on the promise and truthfulness of God, which cannot deceive. Of this the pope is ignorant; hence he wickedly and with his usual fury asserts foolishly that not even the justified and the enlightened can know whether they are worthy of the love, etc. Yea, verily, if they are justified and enlightened, they certainly do know that they are being loved by God, or else they are not justified and enlightened,” Erlangen, Latin, Opp., II, 177.
“Since, in this controversy, the chief topic of Christian doctrine, is treated, which, understood aright, illumines and amplifies the honor of Christ [which is of especial service for the clear, correct understanding of the entire Holy Scriptures, and alone shows the way to the unspeakable treasure and right knowledge of Christ, and alone opens the door to the entire Bible], and brings necessary and most abundant consolation to devout consciences, we ask His Imperial Majesty,” etc., Apology, Chapter II, Article IV, §2, Jacobs, Page 84. Confer Apology, Chapter III, Article VI, §55ff., page 113f.; ibid., §75f., page 116f: “Faith makes sons of God,” etc.

§150. Activity of Faith.

We have noted that in the act of justifying a sinner who believingly accepts the atonement of Christ, God does not regard faith as an action on the part of man, but has appointed faith merely as the instrument and mode by which the benefits of Christ’s work shall be secured to the sinner. Accordingly, we are careful to present the relation of faith to a person’s justification in such a manner, that justification may be seen to be an act of pure grace, without any deed of the Law, without the fulfilment of any condition of the part of man; and that this act of grace may be understood as being executed upon man, not as taking place in men. Not that faith is not an action also in justification; on the contrary, any faith that is not active faith is not faith at all. Inactive, inert, dead faith is as much a contradiction in itself as dry water. The Scriptural use of the phrase in James 2:20, as the connection shows, is a solemn rejection of the matter thus designated, as useless for all purposes of true Christianity. It is merely on account of the true character of the justifying act that we forbear considering faith as an activity of man in this act. However, Scripture compels us to make a very extensive study of the activity of faith in that spiritual state which begins with the moment when the sinner has obtained his pardon. That moment marks a change which the apostle expresses by the words: “Ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit,” 1st Peter 1:22. This purification of the soul has been effected by faith, Acts 15:9, which is “obeying the truth through the Spirit.” Now, John acknowledges persons to be pure and in the same breath urges them to become pure, 1st John 3:3; 2nd Corinthians 7:1. Here the apostle urges people who have “these promises,” i.e., who believe the Gospel of God’s grace to “cleanse themselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, and to perfect holiness in the fear of God.” Moreover, appeals of this nature are made to faith: 2nd Peter 1:5: “Add to your faith virtue”; 1st John 3:3: “Every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself.” Yea, faith is the instrument in this purification; Galatians 5:6, “faith which worketh,” and the method of procedure is “by love,” Galatians 5:6; 1st Peter 1:22. The last passage also shows that love is an end or aim of justifying faith (“unto unfeigned love”). Love requires that a person forgo and eschew whatever clings to him of his old nature, and embraces and cultivates whatever belongs to the new nature. In Ephesians 4:22-24; Colossians 3:10; 2nd Timothy 2:21 Scripture calls this process renewal, renovation. It is in this work that faith exhibits its activity and power also to human eyes. Having first justified, it now proceeds to sanctify the sinner, to adorn him with the graces of a truly Christian life and conduct. In this activity faith rests on the same foundation as in justification, Christ Jesus; for He is of God made unto us not only righteousness but also sanctification, 1st Corinthians 1:30. Moreover, sanctifying faith draws its energies from the same source as justifying faith, Ephesians 3:20; Colossians 1:29, the Holy Spirit, for whose strengthening Christians also pray with and in behalf of one another, James 5:16. The activity of faith is, therefore, as faith itself, a divine work, and as this activity is extensively described in Scripture, and men can in a measure watch it in themselves and in others, we are in a position to study it.

§151. Renovation or Sanctification.

We now come to study an effect in the sinner of the same grace which effected his justification outside of him. Scripture speaks of it as “being renewed” (“anenousthai”), Ephesians 4:23, or “sanctification” (“hagiasmos”), 1st Corinthians 1:30; 1st Thessalonians 4:3. The form of this act we shall study in connection with the next paragraph. It is an effect that takes place in the regenerate, for it is predicated of such “as have received Christ Jesus the Lord,” Colossians 2:6, “are a light in the Lord,” Ephesians 5:8, are “born of God,” 1st John 3:9; 5:4, are “made free from sin,” Romans 6:22, or “dead to sin,” Romans 6:2, have received the promises of God’s indwelling in them, 2nd Corinthians 7:1 (compare with the concluding verses of the preceding chapter). These statements enable us to assign to renovation its correct place in the ordo salutis, namely after illumination, regeneration and justification. However, the point of time must not be pressed in this division; for John says, 1st John 3:9: “Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin.” With the moment of the new birth the committing of sin ceases; for the proximate object of regeneration, so far as the sinner’s daily life is concerned, is the ceasing from sin and the beginning of the contrary of sin. He was “created in Christ Jesus unto good works,” “epi ergois agathois,” Ephesians 2:10. Regarding “epi” with the dative as used in this place, Wilke says that it denotes “rem quam in mente habuit, qui aliquid fecisse dicitur.” Paul accordingly amplifies his statement by adding: “God hath before ordained that we should walk therein.” Therefore, John in the passage just quoted also puts the case thus: “He cannot sin, because he is born of God.” “Ou dynatai” expresses not an absolute, but a relative impossibility, because the reason for it is immediately added: he cannot sin, in so far and as long as he is regenerate. The birth hour of a Christian is also the hour of the first throb of the new life in him, and we divide the life from the birth merely for the purpose of examining each the better.
Regeneration was seen to be the operation of the Spirit. The same Spirit of God remains occupied in and about the regenerate, sanctifying, 1st Thessalonians 5:23, and “leading them,” Romans 8:14 (“agontai” really means propelling, impelling them). He furnishes every impulse in this work. And He does this by the same means that effected regeneration. The washing of which Paul speaks, Titus 3:5, namely baptism, has the twofold effect of regeneration and of renewing of, i.e., by the Holy Ghost (genitivus auctoris). And as the sacraments of Christ operate not by the virtue of the physical elements, but by the divine Word, which is in and with them, we find the Word of God “the truth,” and “all Scripture” named, John 17:17; 2nd Timothy 3:16, 17, as the means of sanctification and of instruction in righteousness, i.e. in doing right. And this means is not a partial but a complete and perfect means, because it “thoroughly furnishes unto all good works.” It is, however, the evangelical Word, that which sets forth “the mercies of God,” Romans 12:1, hence the Gospel, by which the Spirit instils the sanctifying impulses. The Law is also employed in this operation, however for a different purpose, as will be seen in paragraphs 152, 154.
In renovation man cooperates. Spiritual energies have been engendered in him in the act of regeneration, and these the Spirit employs for the purpose of sanctifying the regenerate in his daily conduct. The seed from which the new life sprang remains in the regenerate, 1st John 3:9; light, Ephesians 5:8; faith, Galatians 5:6; the spirit, Galatians 5:16, continues in man after his new birth and renders him capable to join in the tasks
of his new life: to struggle with the flesh, Galatians 5:16, to overcome the world, 1st John 5:4, 5, to perform works of love, Galatians 5:6, of righteousness and truth, Ephesians 5:9, and to be eager to increase the practical qualities of his faith, 2nd Peter 1:5.
Still while cooperating, man is merely an instrument. The force by which he acts is drawn from, strengthened and sustained by God. God and His grace through Christ furnish the ability, increase it for every new task and maintain it to the end. The regenerate is a branch on a vine. He grows fruit but not independently. The power to cooperate is divine grace.

§152. Mode of Sanctification.

Renovation implies and denotes an internal change in a regenerate person, which is so marked and far-reaching, that Scripture applies to it the strong term “metamorphousthe,” Romans 12:2. The two terminal points of this transformation are the old man and the new man. The process by which a person proceeds from one to the other is called “putting off” and “putting on.” The final result of this process is termed “being dead unto” and “being alive unto.”
1) “The old man,” Ephesians 4:22, is a phrase which denotes not the substance but the quality of a person. It is also called “the flesh with its affections and lusts,” Galatians 5:24, “the body of sin,” Romans 6:6, “our members which are upon earth,” Colossians 3:5. It is called old because it draws its origin from remote antiquity, the fall of our first ancestors, the effects of which are transmitted to each human being by propagation. Hence the old man is sin in all its form, and is thus characterized, “the old man with his deeds,” e.g., lying, Colossians 3:9, “the old man which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts,” Ephesians 4:22. Upon this element in man a severe attack was made by divine grace in a person’s regeneration, which broke the deadly spell of sin on man, and in justification which canceled the guilt of sin. But remnants of sin [Triglot Concordia, §58, page 171] remained in the form of defects in the understanding, feebleness of the will and perverseness of the desires. Regenerate Paul recognizes these remnants of evil in him in Romans 7. Against these sanctification proceeds with the aid of the divine Law, which reveals to the regenerate the sinful character of his doings, Romans 3:20; 7:7. In sanctification the conscience of the regenerate is quickened, and he is made to be keenly sensitive of his wickedness, with the aim that he shall separate from the same. But the impulse to quit evil is not furnished him by the Law, but by the Gospel, which sets forth to the regenerate the work of Christ on account of his sins and urges upon him its daily appropriation by virtue of his baptism, Romans 6:4, which has included the old man in him in the death and burial of Christ. In the power of the Gospel grace, by means of his faith in the same, the regenerate lays aside what he has recognized through the Law as being sinful. He becomes “dead to” this or that sin, i.e., he does not knowingly and willingly commit it, and thus he has put off the old man “concerning the former conversation.”
2) However, this act of abdicating old error, suppressing old desires, resisting old weaknesses, does not leave the regenerate a moral blank, no longer bad, but yet not good. Together with the process of putting off the old man there goes the process of putting on the new one. The “new man,”
Colossians 3:10 also is a term, which denotes not the substance, but the quality of the regenerate. It is the form which that new life assumes which was implanted in man in regeneration. The spiritual ignorance of the natural man gives way to knowledge, Colossians 3:10; the will becomes firm in the determination to live righteously, and the desires become sanctified in the true holiness, Ephesians 4:24. The regenerate receives, so to speak, spiritual character and personality by this process.
The Law aids in this process in so far as it reveals and teaches that conduct, which God requires in man, and which is pleasing to Him; however, the impulse and strength to yield obedience to and to put its injunctions into practice is supplied by the Gospel, which daily urges afresh upon the regenerate the believing appropriation of the power of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, in whom virtually the whole sinner world rose to walk in newness of life, even as Christ Himself ascended to live in the glory of the heaven of holiness, Romans 6:4. The risen Christ is the sanctifying power in His followers through the energy which He constantly exerts towards them by His gracious word and ordinances, and causes them, whom He quickened into spiritual life by His first call of grace to be “alive unto God,” Romans 6:11, and to manifest spiritual life in their thoughts, desires and every other action.
We speak of the spiritual state ensuing through sanctification as the new life of Christians. But in another respect we might call it the oldest life that has been led by the human race, were it not for the element of sin, still present in the sanctified. For in sanctification the divine traits begin to reappear, which adorned the first human being when the Creator had breathed into them. The divine image is made to reappear in this process, and so the apostle, Colossians 3:10, says of the “new man” that he is “renewed,” i.e., the new man is a restoration of the most ancient form of the life of man in paradise, as far as that restoration can be effected here. That likeness in which our parents were shapen serves as the pattern to the Holy Spirit, who remodels us, that were shapen in iniquity, till our transformation on earth ends in our conformation in heaven to the likeness of our Father.

§153. Progressive Sanctification.

Sanctification is not, like regeneration, or conversion in the strict sense, and like justification, an instantaneous act, but a continued process. It is likened to a growth, 2nd Peter 3:16, from infancy to manhood, Hebrews 5:12-14; Ephesians 4:13, 14; hence it progresses like the physical development of a human being, through stages, which can, in a measure, be marked by the regenerate himself. “Ein Christ ist im Werden, nicht im Worten sein,” Luther. Every faculty of the souls is drawn into this progressive development. The intellect (“the eyes of understanding,” Ephesians 1:17) is illumined with knowledge of Christ, Ephesians 4:13, of His will, Colossians 1:11. A “spirit of wisdom,” Ephesians 1:17, a wisely reflecting mind is bestowed, which is able to judge correctly, Philippians 1:9, and has the thoughts of God revealed to it, Ephesians 1:17. This illuminating goes on from weak beginnings to greater perfection. The “senses are exercised to discern both good and evil,” Hebrews 2:14. The unskilled babe, Hebrews 5:13, grows to a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ, Ephesians 4:13. The unstable judgment as regards misleading doctrines, Ephesians 4:14, becomes ‘strengthened,”
Colossians 1:11, settled in its belief. The former pupil becomes a teacher, Hebrews 5:12. And this is done by the grace of God, 2nd Peter 3:18, through the oracles of God, which are first milk, later strong meat, Hebrews 5:12-14. And the faith of the regenerate is being exercised in this process, Ephesians 4:13.
At the same time the will is acted upon, Philippians 2:13. A conflict is beginning to rage in the heart of the believer, the “sarkopneumatomachia,” Romans 7:15ff.; Galatians 5:17. Daily and hourly the believer is made to face questions of conduct, which he must decide for or against. In this struggle God supports him and grafts him the power to determine his mortal body against the law of sin in his members and for the law of righteousness. It is a severe but salutary exercise; the will gains strength with every fresh struggle, and the victory becomes easier as the battle continues. Faith overcomes the world and all therein.
Lastly, the desires of the believer are being sanctified in this process. The emotions of a Christian are deeply stirred, Acts 17:16, with holy hatred of sin, and with fervent, joyous love of righteousness. The sanctified become habituated to these things and act with motives trained to holiness, as with a spiritual instinct, which is none other than the spirit of Christ which is in them, Galatians 5:16.
Scripture places these matters before us in the form of earnest appeals. This suggests that there is danger of this process not being realized. It is to be remembered that at this stage of the order of salvation the believer cooperates with divine grace. If he fails to do so, a certain spiritual torpor, stagnation, yea, a retrograde movement ensues, and the sanctified may even fall from grace entirely and the spiritual life in him may become utterly extinct. Progressive sanctification is, accordingly, subject to many changes, favorable, unfavorable and fatal. It is slow in some, more rapid in others; it causes more violent struggles to some Christians than to others, and on some occasions more than on others. That any progress in it is made at all is ultimately due to the God, from whom proceed both the sanctified resolves of Christians and their execution.

§154. Good Works.

The doctrine of sanctification must take cognizance at every turn of the actual deeds of those who are being sanctified. These deeds hold a twofold relation to sanctification: they are the effects of it, and they are also the form which sanctification assumes and by which it is known to be actually in progress. Considered from either view point they are necessary. However, in setting forth their necessity the speaker must carefully guard his language. When comparing good men to good trees, who cannot but bring forth good fruit, because as trees have a healthy, fruitful vitality, so good men have a “good treasure” in their heart – the Lord teaches the necessity of consequence, Matthew 7:17, 18; 12:35. The “good treasure” is that very grace which has begotten an evil man unto new life, and which further exerts its power in propelling the regenerate by an inward impulse to good deeds. Likewise Paul shows Romans 6:2-12 that the redemptive acts of Christ, both His death and His resurrection, have been applied to the sinner for the purpose of changing not only his relation but also his entire subsequent conduct toward God, so that the very first grace applied to the sinner has aimed not only at justification,
but also at results beyond that immediate one of justification. Christ “gave himself for us 1) that he might redeem us from all iniquity, 2) and purify us unto himself, a peculiar people, zealous of good works,” Titus 2:14. Christ is accordingly held up to sinners in a twofold aspect: not only as that of the Propitiator and Reconciler of God and Rescuer of men, but also as an “example” to men, John 13:5. We are to “do as He has done,” John 13:15, “love as He has loved,” John 13:34; 15:12; “walk even as He walked,” 1st John 2:6. Hence those who by the new birth are God’s workmanship, are told that they have been “created in Christ Jesus unto good works,” and that God “has before ordained that they should walk in them,” i.e., God has in advance of the performance of these works, laid their performance down as a rule, Ephesians 2:10. And hence it is that when they are “fruitful in every good work,” they walk “worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing,” Colossians 1:10. When grace is applied to a sinner it is applied not for one or two but for all ends of salvation, not for a momentary but for a permanent and final salvation, because all that the sinner, who has received grace, lives while still in the flesh, he lives by faith in the Son of God and by His grace. Hence we claim for good works a necessity of this kind: 1) a necessity of order and sequence, divinely appointed, to justification and faith; 2) a necessity of presence, in order that the indwelling grace of God and faith may be known; 3) a necessity of duty, namely of that of gratitude for the benefits of Christ’s redemption, and of obedience to the divine commandment. But we deny a necessity of cause or merit for justification or salvation. “Extra causam iustificationis nemo potest bona opera a Deo praecepta satis magnifice commendare,” Luther. Our Church maintains this middle ground in opposition to two extreme views. Formula of Concord: “Concerning the doctrine of good works two divisions have arisen in some churches: 1. First, some theologians (George Major, Justis Menius and others, based on expressions of Melanchthon) have differed with reference to the following expressions, where the one side wrote: ‘Good works are necessary for salvation’. ‘It is impossible to be saved without good works’. Also: ‘No one has ever been saved without good works’. But the other side (John Agricola, Nicolaus Amsdorf and the Antinomians) on the contrary, wrote: ‘Good works are injurious to salvation’…. For the thorough statement and decision of this controversy, our doctrine, faith and confession is: 1. That good works certainly and without doubt follow true faith, if it be not a dead, but a living faith, as the fruit of a good tree. 2. We believe, teach and confess also that good works should be entirely excluded, as well when the question at issue is concerning salvation, as in the article of justification before God, as the apostle testifies with clear words, where it is written: ‘Even as David also describeth the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works, saying…. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin’, etc. (Romans 4:6 sqq.). And elsewhere: ‘By grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not of works, lest any man should boast’ (Ephesians 2:8, 9). 3. We believe, teach and confess also that all men, but those especially who are born again and renewed by the Holy Ghost, are bound to do good works. 4. In this sense the words ‘necessary’, ‘should’ and ‘must’ are employed correctly and in a Christian manner, also with respect to the regenerate, and in no way are contrary to the form and language of sound words…. 1. We reject and condemn the following modes of speaking, viz. when it is taught
and written that good works are necessary to salvation. Also, that no one ever has been saved without good works. Also, that it is impossible without good works to be saved. 2. We reject and condemn the unqualified expression: Good works are injurious to salvation, as offensive and detrimental to Christian discipline. For, especially in these last times, it is no less needful to admonish men to Christian discipline (to the way of living aright and godly) and good works, and instruct them how necessary it is that they exercise themselves in good works as a declaration of their faith and gratitude to God, than that the works be not mingled in the article of justification; because men may be damned by an epicurean delusion concerning faith, as well as by Papistic and Pharisaic confidence in their own works and merits. 3. We also reject and condemn the dogma that faith and the indwelling of the Holy Ghost are not lost by wilful sin, but that the saints and elect retain the Holy Ghost, even though they fall into adultery and other sins, and persist therein” (Once in grace, always in grace), “Epitome,” Chapter IV, §1, 2, 5-9. 16-19, Jacobs, pages 503-506. Formula of Concord: “But here we must be well on our guard…. whereby much unnecessary wrangling may be avoided and the Church be preserved from many scandals,” “Solid Declaration,” Chapter IV, §22-36, Jacobs, pages 585-588. Apology: “Good works are to be done on account of God’s command, likewise for the exercise of faith, and on account of confession and giving of thanks,” Chapter III, Article VI, Jacobs, §68, page 115. Good works are called products or fruits of faith, because they freely and spontaneously spring from faith. The believer is obliged but not constrained against his own will to do them, like a slave from fear of punishment. Good works are the joyous and willing exercise of faith. Formula of Concord: “Afterwards a schism arose also between some theologians with respect to the two words, ‘necessary’ and ‘free’, since the one side contended that the word ‘necessary’ should not be employed concerning the new obedience, which does not proceed from necessity and coercion, but from the free will. The other side has retained the word ‘necessary’, because this obedience is not at our option, but regenerate men are bound to render this obedience….
“Nevertheless by the words mentioned, ‘necessity’, and ‘necessary’, if they be employed concerning the regenerate, not coercion, but only due obedience is understood, which the truly believing, so far as they are regenerate, render not from coercion or the impulse of the Law, but from the free will; because they are no more under the Law, but under grace (Romans 6:14; 7:6; 8:14). Therefore we also believe, teach and confess that when it is said: The regenerate do good works from the free will; this should not be understood as though it were at the option of the regenerate man to do or to forbear doing good when he wished, and nevertheless could retain faith when he intentionally persevered in sins. Yet this should not be understood otherwise than as the Lord Christ and his apostles themselves declare, namely, that the liberated spirit does not do this from fear of punishment, as a slave, but from love of righteousness, as children (Romans 8:15),” “Epitome,” Chapter IV, §3, 10-12, Jacobs, pages 504, 505. Formula of Concord: “And first as to the necessity or voluntariness of good works…. The disputation concerning the voluntariness of good works has been introduced especially with this intention,” “Solid Declaration,” Chapter IV, §14-18, Jacobs, pages 584-585.
The good works of the sanctified are not arbitrary actions, performed at the option of their doers, but are
regulated in a twofold manner: 1) by the Law of God, and 2) by the divine example of the Lawgiver during His sojourn on earth. The regenerate have a filial regard for the will of their heavenly Father as regards man’s conduct. This will is expressed in the Ten Commandments. The grace of God seems to deal paradoxically with a sinner: first it takes him from under the Law and teaches him to despise its thunderings and to bid defiance to its curses by faith in Christ, who is the end of the Law. Next it puts him back under the Law and teaches him to love its duties (1st John 5:3: “His commandments are not grievous”) and to covet its blessings. But in being thus under the Law, the believer is not under the Law, namely under its full power. He approaches the duties of the Law in the strength of God’s grace. This is what the psalmist means when he says: “I will run the way of thy commandments, when thou shalt enlarge my heart.” Luther: “Wenn du mein Herz troestest,” Psalm 119:32. “Rachab” in its hiphil form means to make wide, to open up. The heart is closed to God in unbelief, and unbelief also hates God’s will. But when grace has thrown open the gates of man’s heart, that the Lord of Glory may enter and His Spirit dwell there, there enters through this opening also the knowledge and love of God’s holy will. The regenerate, eager to run the way of His commandments, become students (“prove,” Romans 12:2; Ephesians 5:10) and enactors (“keep,” John 14:15 etc.) of the divine will, as it applies to God, 1st John 2:3, 4, and the neighbor, Romans 13:9, 10, and to every person according to his station, Ephesians 6:1, 2. Thus Law and Gospel perform each a distinct function in the matter of a Christian’s good works. Formula of Concord: “But we must also separately explain what with respect to the new obedience of believers the Gospel does, affords and works, and what herein, so far as concerns the good works of believers, is the office of the Law. For the Law says indeed that it is God’s will and command that we should walk in a new life, but it does not give the power and faculty so that we can begin and do it; but the Holy Ghost, who is given and received, not through the Law, but through the preaching of the Gospel (Galatians 3:14), renews the heart. Afterwards the Holy Ghost employs the Law, so that from it he teaches the regenerate, and in the Ten Commandments points out and shows them ‘what is the good and acceptable will of God’ (Romans 12:2), in what good works ‘God hath before ordained that they should walk’ (Ephesians 2:10). He exhorts them thereto, and when, because of the flesh in them, they are idle, negligent and rebellious, he reproves them on that account through the Law, so that he carries on both offices together; he slays and makes alive, he leads to hell and brings up again. For his office is not only to console, but also to reprove, as it is written: ‘When the Holy Ghost is come, he will reprove the world’ (under which also is the old Adam) ‘of sin, and of righteousness and of judgment’. But sin is everything that is contrary to God’s Law. And St. Paul says: ‘All Scripture given by inspiration of God is profitable for doctrine, for reproof’, etc., and to reprove is the peculiar office of the Law. Therefore as often as believers stumble they are reproved by the Holy Ghost from the Law, and by the same Spirit are again comforted and consoled with the preaching of the Holy Gospel,” “Solid Declaration,” Part II, Chapter VI, §10-14, Jacobs, page 597. “Because indeed faith brings the Holy Ghost…. God is not therefore loved, until we apprehend mercy by faith. Thus He at length becomes an object that can be loved,” Apology, Chapter III, §4-8, Jacobs, p. 104f.
Since the good works of the sanctified are determined and regulated by the Law (and exclusively by that, or else they are no good works at all) they are stamped with the character of unselfishness. Never does the believer as such in his actions regard his own will nor does he curry favors with others by courting their pleasure. He rather sacrifices his own inclinations at every turn and is resolved at all times to disappoint the unhallowed wish of others. The result of this procedure is also unselfish: the good works of the sanctified aim solely and alone at the glorification of God, and their doers blush to be named with acclaim by men.
Besides the Law the sanctified have before them as a pattern of its righteousness the perfect example of their Lord Christ, who personally invites His followers to regard His actions as guide posts on their way through life (Section 5). The example of their Lord serves as a commentary to the Law and as a Gospel impulse to the sanctified in their humble efforts: they receive from the life of their Lord the light of knowledge what to do and how to act, and the cheer and strength to proceed to do it in His might. The good works of the believers are rewardable in the present life and in that which is to come, 1st Timothy 4:8; Ephesians 6:2 (“commandment with promise”). “We teach that rewards have been offered and promised to the works of believers. We teach that good works are meritorious, not for the remission of sins, for grace or justification (for these we obtain only by faith), but for other rewards, bodily and spiritual, in this life, and after this life, because Paul says (1st Corinthians 3:8): ‘Every man shall receive his own reward, according to his own labor’. There will, therefore, be different rewards according to different labors,” Apology, Chapter III, §73f., Jacobs, page 116. It must be acknowledged that works deserving of commendation on certain grounds are performed outside of the society of the sanctified, works of civil righteousness, tending to the maintenance of order and to the physical and moral well-being of the community. Paul says, Romans 2:14, 15, that the Gentiles not only have the work of the Law written in their hearts, but also do the things contained in the Law. Confer Augsburg Confession, Article XVIII, §1-5, Jacobs, page 43; Apology, Article XVIII, §70, Jacobs, page 230. While we do not hesitate to call these works civilly and morally good within their domain, and to some extent, we deny that they are spiritually good and God-pleasing, for the persons doing them are enemies of God, while performing these acts, and hence do not act in God’s interest, but in their own. The essential requisites for performing services acceptable to God are wanting in these persons: viz., grace, the Spirit, faith, a good conscience and the fear of God. Accordingly, we may in a manner endorse the works, but not the doer, whose seeming virtues are also sins.

§155. Imputed and Inherent Righteousness Compared.

From what has been stated under the heads of justification and sanctification, it follows that the believer obtains a twofold righteousness, the two kinds of which must be carefully distinguished. Both are the result of obedience, both are secured by faith and both are necessary. But here their agreement ends. The former righteousness is in reality a borrowed one, which the sinners holds by transfer from the original Author of the same: it is the righteousness which Christ
obtained by His perfect obedience, as set forth under the head of the priestly office of Christ, §123, 124. Actively Christ performed the will of God, Hebrews 10:7, from sincere love, John 14:31, in every particular to the last tittle of the Law, Matthew 5:17; Luke 2:51, subjecting Himself from His birth, Galatians 4:4, 5 to His death, John 13:1 to its exactions. Passively Christ permitted Himself to be dealt with as a sinner, whom the avenging justice of God overtakes, suffering in body and soul those temporal and eternal penalties, which, according to the teaching of Scripture, are the inevitable consequences and the due reward of sin. This twofold obedience Christ rendered as the representative of the human race, for whom the redeeming counsel of grace had substituted Him. The righteousness resulting therefrom was acquired for the purpose of being bestowed on those for whom it was acquired. This is done by imputation, i.e., by a decree on the part of God that the doing and dying of Christ shall be regarded as acts of the sinner and as a complete fulfilment of the Law, by the sinner through his proxy, Christ. This judicial decree is in force as soon as the sinner by faith lays claim to the righteousness which Christ has obtained for him. The sinner’s faith is counted unto him for righteousness, and he is righteous by virtue of a righteousness which he has not personally achieved nor helped to achieve, and which he holds only to such an extent and for so long a time as he trustingly believes the promises of God in the Gospel, which state that it was secured for him and has been actually bestowed on him by the mercy of God. This righteousness is an indispensable requisite for salvation. Christ is the only high priest, His work, the only basis on which pardon can be granted, and faith in Him the only way in which the pardon can be appropriated by the sinner. In Him, i.e., in His obedience, is salvation, Acts 4:12, and since it is in none other, therefore His obedience is a necessary cause for salvation.
The other righteousness which the believer obtains is not borrowed but earned and becomes the believer’s property not by a gracious act of imputation on the part of God, but by gracious guidance of personal efforts of the believer, who strives to obey God’s Law. While the righteousness of Christ comes to the believer from without and adheres to him, as a garment to him who wears it, the righteousness of which we are speaking now originates in the believer himself and inheres in him, “in the spirit of his mind,” Ephesians 4:23.
The two kinds of righteousness which the believer holds are related to each other as cause and effect. Paul expresses this relation, Romans 6:22: “Being made free from sin” (viz., by the justifying sentence of God) “and have become servants of God” (viz., by the new obedience in renovation) “ye have your fruit unto holiness,” “karpon eis hagiasmon.” Luther: “Euere Frucht, dass ihr heilig werdet.” “Eis hagiasmon” is better rendered “unto sanctification.” The deliverance from the guilt and the dominion of sin has created a condition in the heart of the believer, which renders it not only possible but necessary, Matthew 7:17, 18; 12:35, for him to acquire personal righteousness by a holy conduct. It is just as impossible for him not to do good works as for a light that has been lighted not to shine. Besides the works of righteousness which a justified believer does are necessary as an evidence to the world at large of the actual presence (James 2:18; John 13:35) and working (Galatians 5:6) in him of sanctifying faith. Accordingly, Paul insists in strong and earnest terms “that they which have believed in God,” i.e., such as have become believers and
thereby justified, must “be careful to maintain (‘proistasthai’) good works for necessary uses,” Titus 3:8, 14. Like stewards in charge of a household they must supply each necessity as it arises.
However, this personal obedience of the believers, inasmuch as it flows from faith which alone saves and saves entirely, cannot be regarded as a cause of his salvation, not even a secondary or auxiliary cause. For the emphatic use of the so-called exclusive particles (“not by works of righteousness, which we have done,” Titus 3:5; “not of yourselves,” “not of works,” Ephesians 2:8, 9; “without the deeds of the law,” Romans 3:28) utterly bars out this view and makes salvation a pure “gift” of divine “mercy” and “grace,” Titus 3:5; 2:11.

§156. Sanctification Imperfect in this Life.

We have seen that the two kinds of righteousness which the believer obtains differ as to their origin and as to the mode in which the believer comes into possession of them. The present paragraph shows that they differ also as regards their extent. Imputed righteousness is nothing but the righteousness of Christ. But Christ’s obedience was without flaw, perfect. Therefore, the righteousness which results from it is consummate. The possession of this righteousness means that the believer has no sin, Romans 4:7 8; 1st John 1:7, that there is for him no condemnation, Romans 8:1, and no punishment, Isaiah 53:5. If this righteousness were defective in one point, it would be altogether worthless for the purpose of justification, according to the statement in James 2:10.
The case is different as regards inherent righteousness. The latter is our own obedience, wrought out under many difficulties and with varying success in daily renewal. (Compare Notes on §153.) There is in the regenerate, besides renewing grace a residue of sinful flesh, for spiritual regeneration does not produce a new body, it works no physical change. The believer is painfully put in mind of this fact, whenever he engages, be it only for a moment, in self-examination. He observes not only round about him, but also within himself in the very members of his body, in his passing thoughts an element of unholiness. “Evil is present with him,” Romans 7:21; there is a “law of sin in his members,” verse 23, i.e., a wicked principle. This principle is not in one or two members, but in all. Hence the apostle says: “I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing,” verse 18, and horror-struck, as it were, at this observance, he exclaims: “O wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from the body of this death!” verse 26. The apostle uses the expression “this death” in about the same sense as Pharaoh, when he implored Moses to remove the plague of locusts, saying, “Take away from me this death only,” Exodus 10:17. He views the pernicious principle in him personified, having a body, as it were, and that body is his own body, for the principle has possessed every part of it. And it is an active principle; it was against the other law in the regenerate, against the new principle of holiness, implanted in the new birth; it lusts against the spirit,” Galatians 5:17; it defeats the good intentions of the believer, Romans 7:18; Galatians 5:17; it is on the alert, like a watchful enemy, surrounding the believer and endeavoring to discern a weak point (Hebrews 12:1, “tän euperistaton hamartian,” the sin, which has well surrounded us, closed in upon us). It strives to
gain the mastery over the Christian, to bring him into captivity of the law of sin, Romans 7:24, to make him obey its lusts, in order that it may reign in his body, Romans 6:12. Against this residue of sinful flesh the apostle prays for deliverance, Romans 7:24, and all who address God as their Father are taught thus to pray, Matthew 6:12. Now in all the passages cited, the persons speaking or spoken to are regenerate, believers. This feature should be carefully noted. Nor were these regenerate persons exceptional cases, for when James [3:2] states: “In many things we offend all,” he makes the personal experience of Paul in this respect the universal experience of all Christians. John advocates a step further in this respect, and gives the lie point blank to any person who claims to be immune from such onslaughts of sin, 1st John 1:8, while Isaiah invites the would-be saints of his day to examine closely the robe of righteousness, which they had thrown about them, and note that it is in reality filthy rags which they are wearing, Isaiah 64:6. We have reason to remember this topic in view of the “works of supererogation,” which the Roman Church boasts, also in view of the claim of perfect sanctification set up by the Methodist Church.
The inherent righteousness of believers is, indeed, righteousness, but only in an incipient form. It is the beginning of a good work, Philippians 1:6; it progresses day by day, 2nd Corinthians 4:16; it is always “perfecting holiness,” 2nd Corinthians 7:1 (“epitelountes hagioosynan,” Luther: “Lasset uns fortfahren mit der Heilogung” [sic]), but there is no case recorded that this process has ever reached the final stage within the space of any Christian’s earthly life. Paul, who strove after it, acknowledges at the end of his life, that he has not reached it, Philippians 3:12. Nor does he hope to reach, or see any one else reach it this side of the gate of heaven, Ephesians 4:13. Yonder it shall appear what we shall be, 1st John 3:2, namely, when the lost image of God shall again adorn us, we shall be pure and holy also by an internal righteousness.
The reason, then, why our righteousnesses are still accounted good works is not because of their own intrinsic worth, but because of the person of the doer, who is, though feebly, endeavoring to perform them in accordance with God’s Law. God loves the believer for Christ’s sake, who has reconciled and still pleads for him, and therefore He also loves the believer’s works. If we could imagine the inherent righteousness of Christians to exist separately, severed from their imputed righteousness, it would be worth no more than the works of civil righteousness, which the unregenerate perform. But because the merit of Christ is ours by faith, all our actions are guided, as it were, by it, and since faith draws constantly upon the resources of grace, which the Gospel of Christ has supplied, our inchoate righteousness is not a futile endeavor. We follow after it, that we may apprehend that for which we also are apprehended of Christ Jesus, Philippians 3:13. And we are confident of the end, when we consider who He is who made the beginning, Philippians 1:6.
“For of the Law, they speak thus…. Is vain and wicked” (view of the Law – supererogation), Apology, Chapter VI, §45, Jacobs, page 204f.
“It is undeniable…. were a state of Christian perfection” (monkish practices), Augsburg Confession, Article XXVII, §44-46, page 60.
“Again, what need is there of a long discussion…. Who is not tempted by lust?” (examples of unfulfilled Law), Apology, Chapter III, §45, 46, page 111f.
“Although this free will… complains concerning himself” (free will weak), Formula of Concord, “Epitome,” Chapter IV, §13, page 505.
“Although, in this way, good works ought to follow faith…. This godless opinion concerning works we condemn” (effect of confidence in our good works), Apology, Chapter III, §82f., page 117.
“The adversaries, in the Confutation, have also cited against us Colossians 3:14…. arising from the schisms” (refutation of Scriptural argument), Apology, Chapter III, §110, 111, page 123f.
“Also that man… by which we merit eternal life” (merit of our works rejected), Formula of Concord, “Epitome,” Chapter II, §12, page 499.
“Also the following doctrine… merit eternal life” (idea of fulfilment rejected), Formula of Concord, “Solid Declaration,” Chapter II, §79, page 567.
“Our adversaries not only ascribe this to works, viz…. not on account of our merits” (reward), Apology, Chapter III, §239-241, page 153.
“In the second place…. accepted only on account of faith” (our works not acceptable for their own sake), Apology, Chapter III, §39, 40, page 109f.
“For good works follow this faith…. For thus all is well” (Why are the works of the justified righteous?), Smalcald Articles, Part III, Article XIII, §2, 3, page 335.
“There is also no controversy…. if the works of that person are to please him” (works good, because person good), Formula of Concord, “Solid Declaration,” Chapter IV, §8, page 583.
“So, too, the doctrine of the Law…. no man living be justified” (why Law prescribes good works to believer), Formula of Concord, “Solid Declaration,” Chapter VI, §21, page 598f.

§157. The Invisible Church.

All the gracious operations of the Holy Spirit so far exhibited under the head of Soteriology are directed toward individuals. Each of them is by faith brought into union and communion with God, having his sonship with the Father restored to him. The same act which reestablished this relation, establishes also the relation of brotherhood among the believers with one another. From the afore-named operations of the Spirit, then, there arises in this world a peculiar community, firmly consolidated, “fitly framed together,” Ephesians 2:21, which Scripture calls the Church. The English term “church” is derived from the Greek “kyriakä,” meaning the Lord’s house or assembly (“kyrios” from “kyros”) (not from the old German “kueren,” which would mean the chosen assembly, though this meaning would in itself be appropriate and applicable). The English appellation emphasizes the intimate union of believers with the Lord Christ, and a loyal fealty, which a vassal brings to his liege lord. In the New Testament the Church is designated by “ekkläsia” from “ekkalein,” signifying the assembly that has been summoned forth by an authoritative call of a leader. “Ekkläsia” has been rendered twice by “church,” Ephesians 5:25, 27 and elsewhere in the N. T.
The characteristics of the members of the Church are indicated by faith and its immediate effect, justification,
sometimes by both, Ephesians 1:1; Colossians 1:2; sometimes by the former alone, John 10:26, 27; sometimes by the latter alone, Ephesians 2:19; 5:25-27; 1st Peter 2:9. Regeneration is the indispensable requisite for membership in the Church, and hence, such terms as “the believers,” “the righteous,” “the children of God” are synonyms of the Church, expressing the relation of its members to God. The idea of union is expressed by such figurative terms as “commonwealth,” Ephesians 2:19; 1st Peter 2:9, “family,” also by “flock,” John 10:27. The Church, then, is the community of the regenerate.
The Church is a fact and a known entity, however, of a spiritual order; for the essential requisite for membership in her, faith, is a spiritual fact, and justification its immediate effect, by which God acknowledges a person’s membership. Spiritual matters must be spiritually discerned. The Pharisees in the days of our Lord were looking for a visible advent of the Kingdom of God; they expected to witness its public and glorious establishment in their land, Luke 17:20, 21. Christ refutes their error by a negative and positive statement: “Ouk erchetai hä basileia tou theou meta paratäräseoos oude erousin, Idou hoode ä idou ekei.” “‘Paratäräseoos’ – ita ut longinquo observari possit,” Christian Gottlob Wilke, Clavis Novi Testamenti philologica: usibus scholarum et iuvenum theologiae studiosorum accommodata, volumen II (Dresden: 1841, 1850), pagina, 165. “Meta tinos” describes “sic plerumque forma sive species externa, quam id, quod facere aliquis dicitur, prae se fert (ita distinguitur a ‘meta’ praepositio ‘en’) et possit formula adhibita in plerisque locis cognato permutari adverbio aut participio,” Wilke, II, 36. Adopting this suggestion, we render: “The Kingdom of God does not come perceptibly.” It has no form visible to our eyes. Hence we cannot locate it geographically. It certainly has location, e.g., at Philippi, Philippians 1:1, but it cannot be exhibited to the eye. The reason is: “Hä basileia tou theou entos hymoon estin.” “Opponitur extra, atque id quod venit procul adspectabile,” Wilke, I, 390. Christ tells the Pharisees, the Kingdom of God will not approach their borders from without, will not come a long distance and knock at the gates of Jerusalem demanding admission, but is already set up in their midst. The power of Christ was even then exercised throughout the land, and the Church was verily there. The Godman, in His omniscience, read the thoughts of the men of His time and knew who were His little flock. To Him the Church is always visible, 2nd Timothy 2:19. “Themelios tou theou,” according to verse 18, is the true doctrine of salvation, Ephesians 2:20: “the foundation of the apostles and prophets.” This foundation seems to be subverted by some, as by Hymenaeus and Philetus, verses 17, 18. But it stands unmoved in spite of defections from it; for the doctrine of the apostles and prophets has been sealed, i.e., authentically affirmed by two statements: 1) the Lord knoweth (really He has known, namely, has graciously known from eternity) them that are His. Due to the efficacy of the Gospel, there will always be people on this world, who are truly God’s own and whom God beholds as such. These cannot be utterly destroyed. Upon the foundation that God has laid there will also be living stones built upon it for a spiritual dwelling. 2) These people depart from iniquity by naming the name of Christ, i.e., by professing Christ their Savior. They are regenerate and justified persons. They separate themselves from the world that lieth in corruption and adhere only to Jesus. They are sanctified people. Thus they are, by imputed and inherent righteousness, a holy community, however, invisible as such not only to the world, but also to
themselves, 1st Kings 19:14, 18, and are known to God alone, not only in a general but in a very particular way, even to their exact number (7,000).
Besides the properties of invisibility and holiness we must ascribe to the Church unity and universality (catholicity). (Both qualities are really one, the former represents the internal, the latter the external side.) By the unity of the Church is meant that it can neither be divided nor multiplied. Ephesians 4:3-6 shows that the holy Trinity is drawn into this unity: the Church is one body into which the “one spirit” by baptism introduces each believer as a member and feeds him by the Lord’s Supper, 1st Corinthians 12:13. This body acknowledges one Lord, whose voice it hears, i.e., obeys in the Gospel, as sheep obey their Shepherd, John 10:16, and it is protected from without and governed from within by one Father. God, in His saving efforts acts with an equal love towards all (“ye are called in one hope of your calling”); and He employs the same means towards all. Hence the faith of the members of the Church which results from His endeavors also exists in unity. Moreover, the Church is passing through the same experiences in this earth, so that all rejoice in the same hope, while all patiently submit to the same trials of their faith and all seek light and strength from God in prayer, Romans 12:12. There has never been a plurality of assemblies of this nature existing at the same time.
The Church regards no physical or social distinctions among its members; Jew and Gentile, bond and free (1st Corinthians 12:13; John 16:16) and persons of every kindred, tongue, people and nation are gathered into it, Romans 5:10. Outward uniformity is not aimed at, Romans 12:4, for the Church is not “an external polity, but scattered throughout the entire globe” Apology, IV, 10. The designation “apostolic” which is applied to the Church in the Nicene Creed expresses that the Church (in its present state was begun in the days of the apostles) was built up by the labor of the apostles and uniformly accepts their teachings.
The relation of this Church to Christ, and therewith the four properties afore-mentioned, are figuratively described.
a) by comparisons of a body to its head. Ephesians 1:22, 23: “auton edooken kephalän hyper panta tä ekkläsia, hätis estin to sooma autou, to plärooma tou ta [Tischendorf] panta pläroumenou.” Romans 12:5: “Hoi polloi hen sooma esmen en christoo.” Ephesians 4:12: “pros ton katartismon toon hagioon eis ergon diakonias, eis oikodomän tou soomatos tou christou.” Ephesians 4:15: “auxäsoomen eis auton ta panta, hos estin hä kephalä, christos [T.].” Ephesians 5:23: “Hoti [T.] anär estin kephalä täs gynaikos hoos kai ho christos kephalä täs ekkläsias.” Colossians 1:18: “Kai autos estin hä kephalä tou soomatos, täs ekkläsias.” The society of believers is called a body in the sense in which we speak of a civic body, the body politic, the student body etc. The description is figurative but not the matter described. The assembly of Christ’s people actually represents in its compactness and indivisibility the true likeness of a body built up of many members. This body is called “Christ’s body,” Ephesians 1:23; 4:12, or “one body in Christ,” Romans 12:5. The former expression declares Christ to be the Author and Ruler of the body, the latter makes Him the point of union, in which all members meet. Christ is called the Head of this body in the sense in which we speak of the head of a family, of a state, or any society. But it again is the expression that is figurative. Christ really and truly exercises the functions of the head over His body: He guards its interests and the body obeys His will.
b) by comparison of a temple to its foundation and corner-stone. Ephesians 2:20-22: “Epoikodomäthentes epi too themelioo toon apostoloon kai prophätoon, ontos akrojooniaiou autou christou Iäsou [T.], en hoo pasa [T.] oikodomä synarmologoumenä auxei eis naon hagion en kyrioo, en hoo kai hymeis synoikodomeisthe eis katoiktärion tou theou en pneumati.” 1st Corinthians 3:11: “Themelion gar allon oudeis dynatai theinai para ton keimenon, hos estin christos Iäsous [T.].” 2nd Corinthians 6:16: “Hymeis gar naos theou este dzoontos.” 1st Peter 2:6: “Idou, tithämi en Zioon lithon akrojooniaion eklekton entimon.” The three expressions applied to the Church in this connection signify 1) “oikodomä,” Ephesians 2:21, the building in actual process of erection; 2) “naos,” 2nd Corinthians 6:16, the sacred character of the building; 3) “katoikätarion,” Ephesians 2:22, the building as a dwelling place or home. Christ is called 1) “themelios,” 2) “akrogooniaios” of this building. The former term is wider in meaning and also embraces the apostles’ and prophets’ doctrines, the central part of which is Christ, Ephesians 2:20. Christ is the foundation of the Church 1) by His Word, or teaching, 2) by His work of atonement, 3) by His example. The members of the Church as living stones are built up on Him by faith, which accepts His teaching. appropriates His merits and embraces His life as a pattern of holiness.
This Church is indestructible, ever enduring. Its foundation is sure. It is laid by the merciful counsel of God in eternity, 1st Peter 2:6. The statement of Christ to Peter: “epi tautä tä petra oikodomäsoo mou tän ekkläsian” refers to Christ Himself, whom Peter had confessed, and had thereby made himself a “petros,” a rock-man, of firm convictions and differing from the wavering opinion of the men of his time which had been expressed concerning Christ, verse 13f. Christ is the Rock, whom ages of unbelief and multitudes of fierce assailants shall not subvert. “Pyla hadou,” the gates of hell, signifies the very pick of hell’s hostile forces, the best troops in olden times being given positions about the gates of a town. The Church may suffer severe trials and become a storm-swept, shattered citadel, almost vanquished, but it is never ruined. Her strength for defense is always greater than the assailants. Yea, her strength is made perfect in weakness. She is like a timid flock of sheep, seemingly incapable of defensive effort and an easy prey to wolves. Yet the Shepherd declares: “Neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand,” John 10:28. The reason He offers in the next verse: “The Father who has given them to me is greater than all.” “Cheir” thus signifies the power of Christ, which is none other than the invincible power, the omnipotence of God Himself. These facts necessitate the setting up of the claim that the Church cannot err. Her members are indeed exposed to temptations so great, that, if it were possible, they should be deceived, Matthew 24:24. And some of her members actually fall into error, sometimes for a time, sometimes forever. But it is not possible that the entire Church could err at the same time, for in that case there would be a period, no matter how small, in which Christ could not be with His Church, contrary to His promise, Matthew 28:20, because there would be no body to which He could unite Himself as the Head.
In Ephesians 2:19 the apostle calls the Ephesians prior to their conversion “strangers and foreigners,” i.e., persons who at that time had no share in the assembly of the saints. In verse 12 of the same chapter he has shown the awful import of these terms; for he there calls the same persons “aliens from
the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenant of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.” In chapter 5:8 he calls them “sometimes darkness,” confer 1st Peter 2:9. From these and similar statements the aphorism has been deduced: Extra ecclesiam nulla salus.” The Church which we have so far described is the alone saving Church, because if any one is saved in any other way, or by any other means, or for any other ends than the members of this Church, the unity and universality of the Church world be destroyed. If, however, the same means and manner were employed without producing the same effect of bringing the particular individual into communion with the Church, the comparison of a body and its members with the head, or of a building and its stones with the foundation, would not apply. Moreover, Peter declares that his hearers became a holy nation, a chosen generation when they were called out of darkness into light, thereby signifying that admission to the Church is contemporaneous with enlightening or regeneration. Outside of the Church there is no salvation – this expression, accordingly signifies that only regenerate persons are saved, and that God’s spiritual children are born in God’s home on earth, not outside. As little as the Church exists among those who refuse Christ and His Word, so little can conversion take place among these people. They have nothing wherewith to save men.

§158. Visible Churches.

Faith constitutes a person a member of the invisible Church. This faith, however, is from and in the Gospel. The Gospel is a matter that can be perceived by the senses. We can see and hear it. We can also observe the manner in which people are occupied with the Gospel. We notice that some are not in possession at all of the Gospel. The Bible has not been brought to them. Hence the means whereby faith cometh, is lacking to these people; hence faith itself is lacking, hence also membership in the invisible Church. Others have the Gospel, i.e., they are within easy reach of it; they can read or hear it; but neglect to do so. Hence they remain unaffected by the power of the Gospel, i.e., without faith, hence outside of the invisible Church. Still others have and hear the Gospel, but they oppose it, deny its truth and reject its teaching. For the same reason as the classes before mentioned, these, too, are outside of the Church. Finally there are those who have and hear the Gospel, and who profess the entire Scriptures, the Christian religion. But whether they do so sincerely, whether their action is truly the work of the Holy Spirit, or whether the devil is transformed in them into an angel of light, this cannot be determined by the senses. We simply assume that all who have and hear the Gospel and profess the Christian religion are really believers, and hence we call the entire visible organization of men who do this the Church. This is done by a common figure of speech: the whole being named for its chief and noblest part (denominatio fit a potiore parte). Hence we accord also to those who are not truly members of the invisible Church, but still maintain an outward relation to and communion with a visible society of people organized for the uses and purposes of the Gospel of Christ, the name Christians, while we acknowledge that this name may in reality be misapplied. This applies not only to the entire body of professing Christians throughout the world, but also to each and every local organization of professing Christians. There is a universal
Church that is visible and there are particular visible Churches. In applying to these communities the name church we simply follow Scriptural usage: in the first place, that of the Lord Himself. Christ compares the Kingdom of Heaven to a dragnet, Matthew 13:47, 48, and to guests bidden to a marriage, Matthew 22:2, 11; 25:1, 2. The casting and the drawing of the net in the former parable, and the summons to the brides and the invitation to the guests in the latter represent the call of grace issued through the Gospel. The call is issued to men indiscriminately, and many follow it but not all obey it. Its aim is to change the hearts of those to whom it is addressed. It makes bad men good by working faith in the forgiveness of their sins in them. This faith is the wedding garment in which the King robes the guests at the marriage of His Son, as was the custom at Oriental weddings, Judges 14:12. Yea, faith makes a person a bride of Christ, with whom Christ joins Himself in the everlasting union of heavenly joy. All who accept the call in such a manner that its true aim is achieved are good fish, welcomed guests and wise virgins. But it is possible to share acceptance without faith in the call, to go into the net, i.e. to allow the Gospel to be proclaimed and preached to oneself while refusing to appropriate its gracious gifts; it is possible for me to be among the society of friends of Jesus, who wait for His coming and even to bear oneself as an appointed bride of Christ by a lamp for His coming. But the lamp, i.e., the outward behavior, is worthless, because it is not burning. The seemingly good works are not good works for they are not fed by the oil of faith. Thus it happens that bad fish are enclosed in the net, unworthy guests are found at the banquet, faithless brides are among the virgins of Christ. For the time being, they all, good and bad, form one visible community, the good often not being aware of the presence of the bad, who mingle with them. And for the time being the Lord calls this entire assembly “the Kingdom of Heaven,” meaning the visible Church of God.
In the second place, we have also apostolic usage to guide us in this matter. When Paul addressed his letter to the churches of Galatia, chapter 1:2, that letter had to be delivered to a visible society of men, and the contents of that letter show that with very many members of that society Paul found serious fault even in regard to such an important matter as the true doctrine of justification. Still he calls them churches. John recognized in one of his churches a Diotrephes, who was not a mere common member, but a man of great influence in the congregation, and yet showed by his malicious actions that he was not a Christian, for he harmed the Christians in and outside of his Church, 1st John 3:9, 10. Still John sent instructions regarding this person to the local congregation of which he was a member, in accordance with the Lord’s rule laid down in Matthew 18:17. In that passage the Lord recognizes a local congregation of which he was a member to which report can be made. And this congregation has in its midst offending members, who do not obey the Word of God. Yes, Christ assumes that this disobedience can reach the degree of contumacy, so that the congregation may be compelled to pronounce on one of its own members the verdict that he is an infidel and a profligate and to expel him. In Chapters 2 and 3 of Revelation we find seven letters of Christ addressed to as many congregations in Asia. In six of them the Lord finds cause to administer most earnest reproof to the members, e.g., in the Laodicean congregation He beholds great spiritual indifference and security, coupled with pride. Still He calls them churches.
This view of the Church is based on the power of God’s Word to accomplish His saving designs. The Word is like the seed scattered on the barren earth (Isaiah 55:10, 11). It falls indeed in many sterile places, yielding no fruit at all or not arriving at perfect fruitage. But it does yield fruit, and that abundantly, in some places, Luke 8:11-15. The hardness of men’s hearts, their false enthusiasm, which soon subsides, and the temptations which stifle the growth of God’s Word cannot deprive the Lord utterly of His harvest. His Word does not return void but prospers wherein it is sown. And the good results attained even in one fourth part of the field sown lend dignity to the entire field. It is called the Lord’s field, because from it, viewed as a whole, though not from every part of it, the heavenly granaries are filled in the day of the reaping.
We are thus enabled to deal with the Church as with a tangible object. The Church invisible would be removed from our ken and grasp. But through the Church visible we approach it and join in its upbuilding. The Church visible is the door, so to speak, of the Church invisible. This view makes the Church of Christ, the communion of saints, a very real, practical and serious issue of every day life.
But it has been held, that if hypocrites are not members of the invisible Church, they should not be allowed to share the dignity of a Christian name, and the rights and privileges of believers. There have been purists in the Church who have striven by vigorous discipline to eliminate from the visible Church the possibility of hypocritical membership. Such were the Montanists and Donatists of old, who have had many followers in the centuries since. All chiliastic or millenarian views down to our own time are leavened with the error, that there must be on this earth at some time a visible Church of God in which all the attributes of the invisible Church, unity, universality, sanctity etc. shall become manifest and cognizable to the eye. Scripture does not foster these views, but by the teaching before exhibited refutes them. As to the proper treatment of false members of the Church, Christ has laid down a plain and strict rule how to deal with them, whenever they become manifest. This rule no visible organization of Christians has a right to disregard or to set aside. Christ has also promised that He will aid in revealing hypocrisy. His apostles have acted in accordance with Christ’s rule, and that has been found sufficient for the safe continuance of the Church. The Church has existed through all generations in spite of the presence of hypocrites in her. The forces of evil, though they have inflicted immense harm at times, have succeeded in doing so, merely because the rule of Christ was being forgotten; but they have never succeeded in subverting the entire Church. Hence absolute purity, such as demanded by the errorists afore-mentioned is not an indispensable requisite for the existence of the Church. The Church of Christ is to be supported and maintained by the Lord and His omnipotent Word of grace, without the aid of human devices. Christ by this teaching concerning the Church visible exhorts us to commit the fortunes of His true Church solely and entirely to Him.
Moreover, purism is not feasible at all. Priests cannot discern what is invisible, just as little as other men. Faith and hypocrisy are both invisible. The purist must therefore, always resort to the device of setting up some visible criterion by which it is proposed to test the genuineness of a person’s membership in the Church. And he will apply his test with such success as this: he will put out of the Church true believers, simply because they do not submit to his test, because they
deny the authority of the imposer and the practicability of what is imposed. And on the other hand, he will retain in the Church hypocrites, whose sole merit may be that they have submitted to the test, which they are all the more willing to do, because if affords them an easy way to obtain an outward badge of membership in lieu of the true inward badge, which they feel themselves that they are lacking. Thus purists work in both directions to the damage of the Church. If the Church had really been commissioned to determine the actual number of members and to visibly exhibit the same on earth, what need would there be of a future day of separation and judgment? The complete and unerring separation which Christ has expressly reserved for that day and for Himself would in that case have taken place before His coming, and He could do no more than sanction the action of the Church.
Christ has, accordingly, taught His Church humble submission to His will and patient forbearance towards the faults and errors of men, however, within the well-defined bounds noted before. As He is long-suffering towards sinners, so the Church, which is His body, must also be. This does not at all hand the Church over to indifferentism and laxity, to latitudinarian views and practices, to broad-churchism, but merely makes the members of the Church careful, circumspect, humble in her dealings with men.
Finally, the visible Church is the sphere of activity for the Christian pastor. Through it his call is issued and towards it his ministrations are directed. And he must minister to all impartially, to the believers, whom he does not see, but thinks he sees, and to the hypocrites, alike, whom he thinks he sees but does not really see. He must not make pietistic divisions in his congregation, but if divisions must come, the cleavage must occur on clear-cut lines of the Word of Christ. The Word of Christ reveals the thoughts and intents of men, and the pastor can afford to wait until it pleases Christ to make such a revelation. Then it is time, not before, for the pastor and his congregation to act in accordance with Christ’s rule. Whatever is not thus revealed, publicly and manifestly the pastor must commit to the final judgment and in the mean time must bear with all patience. Nor must he attempt to measure the success of his labors by trying to take a census of the invisible church membership within his visible charge. Whether he has accessions or defections from his organization, he must in an even manner continue to preach the Word of Christ, and gauge the character of his visible congregation, as far as that can be done, alone by this mark.

§159. The Marks of the Church.

The invisible Church or the community of the regenerate has no existence, except through the means of grace by which regeneration is effected, by which faith is wrought and preserved in the hearts of men. These means, the Gospel and the sacraments, are objects of sense perception; they are in public use in certain localities in this world. Now admission into the Church invisible is not obtained except by embracing these means. Accordingly, the mere fact that a person or persons enter into a certain outward relation to the Gospel and the sacraments of Christ, by organizing a society for the purpose of keeping these means in constant and regular use among them is presumptive evidence that in their midst the Church invisible exists. Of the earliest known communities of
Christians the fact has therefore been recorded as a significant matter that its members constantly adhered (“proskartarountes”) to four things: 1) “Tä didachä toon apostoloon,” i.e., to the personal teachings of the apostles who were then living among them, and to the sacred ordinances which these holy men had set up amongst them in accordance with the Lord’s parting words, Matthew 28:20. 2) “Tä koinoonia,” i.e., they fellowshipped each other, considering themselves a united society and caring for each other by works of charity, supporting their teachers, Galatians 6:6 and taking care of the poor in their midst, Acts 4:34, and elsewhere, Romans 15:26; 2nd Corinthians 8:4. 3) “Tä kläsei tou artou,” i.e., in the celebration of holy communion, Acts 20:7; 1st Corinthians 10:16. 4) “Tais proseuchais,” repeated prayers, petitions and praises. Such were the characteristics of the first society of men, who are called “the saints” at Jerusalem, 2nd Corinthians 9:1, 2. These characteristics, then, serve as the evidence, the marks of the existence of the Christian Church in a certain locality.
It is no presumption to argue from a visible matter to an invisible fact; for Christ has made the preaching of the Gospel, the administration of baptism and the inculcation of all his teaching incumbent upon those whom He sent out to make disciples of all nations, Mark 16:15, 16, promising that He would be with them, Matthew 28:20. Now Christ is in the midst of a congregation of but two or three members, Matthew 18:20, which is assembled in His name, i.e., on the authority of what He has taught and ordained. Hence it is no less a power than that of the divine Lord of heaven, who makes the public use of the Word of God and the sacraments a criterion of the presence of His invisible Church. Moreover, God has attached to the Word which has issued from Him a definite promise of efficiency and success, Isaiah 55:10, 11. It shall accomplish the Lord’s pleasure and successfully perform its appointed mission, so that it does not return void. Compare Isaiah 49:4, 6. The Gospel is, therefore, the power of God (“dynamis theou”). It works with a marvelous energy communicated to it by its Author. Hence whenever it is used, fruits do follow by the Lord’s own declaration. He, before whom the unseen is visible, by these words admits us to a knowledge of a fact which we could not otherwise obtain.
The marks so far mentioned are unfailing; any other marks may be and are deceptive, e.g., the Episcopalians’ contention that there must be an unbroken succession of believing bishops; the pietistic claim that the members of the Church must have experienced peculiar spiritual sensations of joy and sorrow, while passing over into the state of grace; the Enthusiasts’ contention that special illuminations, revelations, prophetic utterances and the manifestation of miraculous powers must occur in the members of the Church; and least of all, the Romish contention that there must be an organized and graded priesthood with a viceregent, or vicar of Christ at its head. All these matters cannot be marks of the Church for the following reasons: 1) because they do not effect justifying and saving faith, which can and does exist outside of each or all these marks; 2) because they are nowhere mentioned as criteria of the Church either in the promises which the Lord has made to His Church, or in the ordinances, which He has set up for the same. A mere human figment, and what is worse, a disturbing element, is often introduced into this matter by means of such marks as men have arbitrarily invented.

§160. Orthodox Church.

The true and unfailing marks of the Church are not exhibited with the same degree of clearness and exactness in all places and at all times. An examination of existing churches by the rule of the afore-mentioned criteria reveals the fact, that while the Gospel and the sacraments of Christ are the same always and everywhere, they are not always and not everywhere understood, interpreted, and publicly professed and administered in the meaning which Christ attached to them and for those ends which Christ had in view. Through the ignorance or malice of men, the sense of Christ’s Word is changed; men either say more, or less, than Christ has said; they either invent teachings which they falsely declare to be Christ’s, or they suppress teachings which Christ has authorized without any doubt. For the same reason and in the same manner those sacred ordinances, which Christ has appointed for the use of His Christians, by attaching His command and promise to them, and which are called the visible Gospel, viz., the sacraments, are changed either as regards their material or their celestial elements, or as regards the form of their administration, or finally, as regards their purpose. This is done against the express will of Christ, who has instructed His disciples to “teach men to observe all things whatsoever (‘panta hosa’) He has commanded,” and has promised His presence with them while they do this, and to the end that they may do so, Matthew 28:20. It follows, then, that so far as this direction of Christ is disregarded, men fail to represent Christ, and forfeit His authority and cooperation in their activity. Again, Christ has demanded continuance in His Word of those who shall be His disciples in truth (aläthoos”) and has promised them an increase of knowledge and power, John 8:31, 32. We conclude from these promises that so soon as men discontinue their allegiance to Christ’s Word, and in proportion as they do so, they cease to be His disciples and beneficiaries of His promises. The Church which wholly follows Christ’s teaching and enacts His ordinance and makes these things for her aim, is the true, or orthodox Church.

§161. Rights of the Church Where Vested.

The Church of believers was compared by Paul (Ephesians 2:19) to a commonwealth and a household. It is an ordered community, a society governed by rules and ordinances. In order to be able to govern there must be a necessary amount of authority, and this authority must have been transferred to the governing body by an unmistakable grant.
1. The Church possesses authority. The passages under Section 1 exhibit this authority in historical order from its first mention to Peter to a statement in Peter’s Epistle. These passages declare that the Church may bind and loose, Matthew 16:19; 18:18, i.e., remit or retain sins, John 20:23, that it may show forth the praises of her God and Lord, 1st Peter 2:9, i.e., proclaim the knowledge of God which she possesses and that she is superior to any preacher or any influence, that she dominates, but is not dominated, 1st Corinthians 3:21-23.
2. Authority has been transferred to the Church by a plain, unimpeachable grant of the Lord. The words spoken to Peter: “I will give thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven,” Matthew 16:19, and to all the apostles: “Receive ye the Holy
Ghost” are a divine grant of the rights, privileges and powers to execute the functions stated immediately afterwards. The grantor was in a position to make this transfer of authority, because He holds all power in heaven and on earth, Matthew 28:18. This grant constitutes the Church a sovereign body, a royal priesthood, 1st Peter 2:9, i.e., a body that exercises the authority and functions of kings and priests, and can make all things subject to those purposes, for which it was organized by the Lord, 1st Corinthians 3:21-23.
3. The authority of the Church is entirely spiritual. It extends only to the consciences of men, which the Church has the right either to ease from guilt, or to burden with an enforced sense of guilt. The Church has power to establish a proper spiritual relation between God and man, and between the believer and his fellow believer, and render a verdict of approval or disapproval on matters which affect that relation. But the Church has no power to attack the physical life, or well-being, or possessions of men. Moreover, the authority of the Church is also exercised by spiritual means, viz., by employing the Word of God, both Law and Gospel and in a spiritual manner: by arguing, reproving, condemning, persuading, absolving, proclaiming, in a word, by setting forth the known will of God from the word of truth, by applying the Word of God to each case and thereby endeavoring to produce the desired spiritual effect in a person. The Church has no authority to employ material means in an effort to coerce or to purchase a person’s consent.
4. The use of this authority is not optional to the Church. The Church was vested with its rights to the end that she should make those uses of them which the Grantor intended and specified. She must not bear her powers merely as a badge of honor, but employ it as a tool for her work among men. She not only may, but must employ her powers; for her members were called out of spiritual darkness to spiritual light for the very purpose of proclaiming the graces, the mercies and the majesty of God, 1st Peter 2:9. And just as plainly as their Lord makes it the duty of an offended Christian, in a certain event, to report the offended to the Church, just as plainly He makes it the duty of the Church to receive the report, to act upon it and to render her decision in due time, Matthew 18:16. The Church, finally, is accountable to the Lord, who has vested her with power, for the use which, as the Lord’s steward and householder, she has made of that power.
5. The authority of the Church when employed in matters belonging to her jurisdiction and in such a manner agreeable to the expressed will of Christ, is efficient and the decisions which the Church renders and the acts which she performs by reason of her vested right are valued on earth among all Christians and in heaven before God. They are endorsed by the Lord and they bind the head of the Church and every member of His spiritual body, to respect and honor them, and to act accordingly, Matthew 16:19; 18:18; John 20:23.
6. This power is possessed and is legitimately exercised by believers. It is the exclusive prerogative of the church invisible. When the grant of the Keys was made to Peter, Peter had just confessed Christ the Son of the living God. Christ accepted this public declaration, not as an expression of mere natural enthusiasm and human admiration; for He states that it had not issued from the flesh and blood of Peter; but He endorsed it as a confession of faith. In the instruction how to deal with a trespassing brother Christ stated that He is present during the deliberations of the Church, whenever the members
are “gathered together in His name,” i.e., in conscious and firm belief that they are acting by the authority of Jesus and are transacting business which the Lord has assigned to them, and in which He cooperates with them. In the evening of Easterday the power to remit and to retain sins was once more solemnly affirmed, but before vesting the disciples with this right, Christ first said: “Receive ye the Holy Ghost,” and to signify to them by an outward sign the actual bestowal of the gift of the Holy Ghost, He breathed on them, as if to say: “As you receive the breath from my mouth so you also receive from my sovereign power the Holy Spirit by whom you must be guided henceforth in carrying out the duties which I shall now lay upon you.” Accordingly, we find that when the apostles write to the churches in regard to their work, they address them “the sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints,” as “those who call upon the name of Jesus Christ,” 1st Corinthians 1:2, as their “brethren,” namely by faith, since faith makes each believer a child of the heavenly Father and a brother to every believer, Galatians 1:2, and those who are “in God” the Father and in the Lord Jesus Christ, and who receive grace and peace from both, 1st Thessalonians 1:1. As the Church itself does not exist where there are no regenerate persons, where faith in God’s Word is not swaying the hearts of men, so the rights of the Church cannot be exercised in such a place. An unbeliever or a body of unbelievers are not vested with any of the spiritual rights, privileges and powers of the Church; they have no authority to deal with men in reference to their relation to God. All that they do in this respect is a sham and delusion, absolutely without validity and force and must be regarded by Christians as if it were not done at all. It is only the one holy Christian Church, the community of saints, that has been endowed with these rights. But within the Church every believing member has and exercises these rights, as a prerogative of his faith.
7. The invisible Church exists locally wherever the means of grace are dispensed and men are formed into a society for the purpose to have these means dispensed to them. As these means are always effectual in creating and maintaining faith, such visible societies also have the power of the Church universal. Each local congregation is vested with the authority to transact within its spheres that spiritual business which Christ has assigned to the whole Church. If it were otherwise, Christ could not have directed the offended brother to tell the offending brother’s trespass and impenitence to the Church, Matthew 18:18. Report cannot be made to an invisible body. The Church, to which the respective parties belong, the church in their place, e.g., “the church of God,” “which is at Antioch,” “at Corinth,” 1st Corinthians 1:2, or “the churches in Galatia,” Galatians 1:2, or “the church of the Thessalonians,” 1st Thessalonians 1:1, is what Christ means. True, these visible organizations contain besides true believers also hypocrites who outwardly exercise the rights of the Church along with the sincere members. However, this does not detract from the validity of the rights, because the Lord, who knows them that are His, regards and honors the actions of His true representatives within such a congregation. Just as any local congregation is called a Christian Church a parte potiori, i.e., on account of the believers whom it embraces, just so that same congregation also exercises the rights of the Church a potiori parte.

§162. The Rights and Powers of the Church.

The rights and powers of the Church are those that Christ exercises in His Kingdom of grace on earth. The Word of Christ is the Law of His realm, to which unconditional obedience is demanded. To proclaim this Word in every form which Christ has given it and to enforce obedience to this Word – that is the right and authority of Church. Confer §128. Christ founded His Church “by bearing witness unto the truth,” and demanded that “everyone that is of the truth should hear” His voice, John 18:37; 10:16, 27. He also demands that those who believe on Him “should continue in” His Word, John 8:31. Accordingly the first and most general right of the Church is to proclaim the Word of Christ, to preach the Gospel, by speech and writing; and also to apply those ordinances to which the command and promise of Christ is attached, and which Christ constituted carriers of grace and badges of discipleship to His followers, namely, the holy sacraments. The express commission to engage in this work is recorded, Matthew 28:18-20; Mark 16:15, 16. By virtue of this commission the Church faces this sinner world as the divinely appointed teacher in matters spiritual, and as the agents and purveyor of saving grace to the nations. Truth and light, comfort and strength to the souls of men must issue from her sanctuary. She must lift up her voice as from a high mountain, calling to the inhabitants of the earth: Behold, your God! Here is Immanuel! This is the way! Walk ye therein! She has also the right to judge every teaching and endeavor, by which men propose to come to God and maintain fellowship with Him. She has the right to try and to condemn heretics and offenders against the truth, 2nd Thessalonians 3:6, 14; Romans 16:17; 2nd Corinthians 10:4, 5. If anyone questions her authority she must appeal to the Scriptures, which serve as her deed title of authority and as her credentials, e.g., when they introduce Christ as saying: “He that heareth you heareth me, and he that despiseth you despiseth me,” Luke 10:16. This right of the Church covers her every activity, by which the proclamation of the Word of Christ and the preservation of its power and teachings is secured. The organizing of congregations, the founding of schools for equipping the Church with able teachers, the appointing of pastors and of aids to the pastor, the detailing of missionaries, the publishing of religious literature, the holding of meetings and conventions etc., all these activities, inasmuch as their aim is to insure the perpetual and abundant possession and to improve the uses of the Word of Christ, are bound up in the general commission to the Church: “Preach the Gospel!”
The rights of the Church admit also of a special application to particular matters and persons, viz., individual sinners and their special sins. The Church has binding and loosing power: she may pronounce a person either a child of God or a heathen man and a publican; she may admit a person to a share in the public blessings of the Gospel, or withhold the Gospel from him, placing him under the curse. And both the absolution and the anathema of the Church are utterances of the mouth of God through His commissioner, the Church. For God has said: “Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth” etc. To this statement the Church must appeal, whenever her authority is questioned, minimized or set aside altogether.

§163. The Ministerial Office.

The rights of the Church are the rights of every member, and that not only in theory, but in a very practical sense, not only by consent of a specially favored class within the Church, but by direct transfer from the Lord. What Christ stated with regard to those rights, He stated to all and to each, to the joint company of the believers and to the individual believer, like Peter, or the two or three who may organize a local congregation. And to every Christian the incidents of life also afford opportunities to exercise this divine right of proclaiming the truth of Christ, by offering His testimony in behalf of this truth, by comforting the sorrowing, by inviting and guiding the churchless to the Word and Church of Christ, and by reproving the erring or denouncing falsehood and vice. In his private relation to other men, within the domestic circle and as a fellow believer he puts the rights which have been accorded to and unfailingly accompanying his faith to practical use.
However, in one respect there is a restriction placed on the believer in the exercise of his inalienable rights: he may not exercise them in public unless specially authorized to do so, 1st Corinthians 12:29. Natural reasons might be adduced why he should not do so, e.g., it would create confusion, strife and factions within the Church, if all Christians at a given place were to exercise the privileges of the Church at the same time; moreover, the proper and efficient exercise of these privileges in a great many cases requires special skill, a certain amount of preparation and continued application, and not every believer is able to comply with these conditions. But there is a scriptural reason: Christ has reserved the public exercise of the authority of the Church to the incumbents of a separate office, which He instituted for this very purpose. While Christ in Matthew 18 plainly gives the Power of the Keys to the entire Church, He addresses particular persons in Matthew 28:19, 20 and in John 20:21, 23. These persons He commissions to go abroad and to teach and baptize in His name. These He sends even as He Himself was sent by the Father. Through these people who perform publicly the privileges and duties of the Church, Christ exercises His prophetic office since His ascension. This commission is to be in force “unto the end of the world,” i.e., as far as the world extends and as long as it endures. That the commission was understood as a grant to particular persons is shown by 1st Corinthians 12:29 (“God hath given to us the ministry”). The apostles were conscious of holding their office by divine appointment, 2nd Corinthians 5:8; Ephesians 4:11. The commission was understood to be permanent, for in Romans 10:15 Paul requires that those who shall preach must be sent even as he and Barnabas and Silas, though called and separated to this office by God, had been sent by the Church at Antioch, and Philip by the Church at Jerusalem. For when Christ in the great commission said: “Teach them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you,” He included this very duty of deputizing and detailing men to preach and administer the sacraments. Accordingly, the apostles not only preached and baptized, but also taught the congregations organized by them to appoint functionaries for those public performances of the duties of the Church. Prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers, 1st Corinthians 12:29; Ephesians 4:11, were appointed to take charge of these duties in particular places. And God endowed these men with the spiritual qualities necessary for this work (Ephesians 4:11, “He gave”) so that Paul says to the elders of Ephesus that the Holy Ghost “hath made them overseers,” Acts 20:28, and reminds them that they are exercising the duties of assistants to Christ, for they “feed the
Church of God,” the flock which Christ has bought with His own blood. Confer 1st Peter 5:2. The office of the apostles, the incumbents of which were limited to the number twelve and to eye and ear witnesses of Christ, Acts 1:21, who had also been appointed directly by Christ, and through whose inspired writings the Holy Spirit continued to direct the newly planted Church, was kept distinct from the office of evangelists etc., 1st Corinthians 12:29; Ephesians 4:11; Romans 16:7: “episämoi en tois apostolois” has been rendered by Luther: “welche sind berufene Apostel.” The Authorized Version has: “of note among the apostles.” But a divine origin and commission was acknowledged also for these latter offices and the congregations were taught to respect them. This office is called a “ministry,” 2nd Corinthians 5:18, because it requires service willingly assumed and unselfishly rendered, 1st Peter 5:2. It is called an “oversight,” Acts 20:28; 1st Peter 5:2 because the incumbents are commissioned to teach the Church not only to know but also to do the will of God. It may be noted that St. Paul uses the expressions “elders,” “presbyters” and “bishop” as equivalents, Acts 20:17, 28. This office is called the “ministry of reconciliation” from the work of Christ on which it rests as on its foundation and from the aim which it pursues, viz., of reconciling sinners to God by persuading them to believe the Gospel of salvation in Christ.

§164. The Ministry: How Conferred.

In the preceding paragraph the ministerial office has been considered abstractly, as in Article 5 of the Augsburg Confession. We now proceed to consider it concretely as in Article 14 of the Augsburg Confession. The ministerial office being an institution for the public, orderly and efficient discharge of those functions, which really are laid upon all Christians, it is rooted within the Church, within each local congregation. While the congregation has not created this office and is not Lord of this institution in the sense that it could alter its character or abrogate it, yet it has a distinct part to act in this office, in its erection at a given place and given time.
The ministerial office exists concretely in particular persons, such as Paul and Apollos, who are called ministers and stewards, 1st Corinthians 3:5; 4:1. They are such “even as the Lord gave to every man.” This phrase signifies not only that the Lord equipped them for the effectual discharge of their duties, but also that He appointed them their spheres of activity, the particular household for which they were to provide as stewards. And when the apostle calls himself and his colleagues ministers of Christ, he means to say, not only that they are executing their office in the interest of Christ and by His aid, but also by His appointment. Not only the institution of the ministerial office, but also the selection of the persons who are to serve in this office are divine acts. The holy Trinity, Galatians 1:1; Acts 20:17, 28 cooperate in the selection and appointment of a Christian minister. The very opening words of a Christian minister’s diploma of vocation, “in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost,” utter a solemn scriptural truth, which the minister must heed for his guidance and support during his term of office. Each person of the Trinity contributes what is peculiar to it: the Father, His love, which prompted Him to give His Son for man’s redemption and who desires that the work of His Son should be fruitful through the ministry; the Son, His grace, which He declared to men, which
He continues to declare through the ministry; the Holy Ghost His wisdom and knowledge, His power and zeal, His comfort and faithfulness, by which He causes men to come to Christ and to believe in Him. Christ, however, is the central figure in this act. As He is the Head, and the Church His body, so this office has a peculiar aim with reference to Him: it is to enable men to “grow up into him in all things,” Ephesians 4:15. He is accordingly the Shepherd and the Church His flock, which He feeds through His ministers. In distinction from the latter He is called “the chief Shepherd,” 1st Peter 5:4, or “that great shepherd,” Hebrews 13:20. The minister’s title of pastor rests on this relation of Christ to His flock; it is to express that he performs the shepherd’s duties among the flock of Christ as Christ’s assistant. And Christ is called the “Bishop of your souls,” 1st Peter 2:25, “episkopos.” The term here used is rendered “overseer” in Acts 20:28, and applied to the ministers of the Church at Ephesus. Their duty is stated thus: “Poimainein tän ekkläsian tou kyriou,” “to feed the church of God.” The Christian minister, accordingly, is Christ’s agent and the representative of the Good Shepherd. The work of the Lord is executed through him, and the Lord’s authority has been conferred to him.
The apostle employs significant terms to show that the appointment of any person who is to minister to the Church is “firm and sure,” an expression of the divine will. He names various ministerial functions in 1st Corinthians 12:28 and Ephesians 4:11 and says in the former place: “God hath set aside (“etheto”) some in the Church” etc., and in the latter: “Christ gave (“edooken”) some” etc. In both places the object of the respective verb is not the office in the abstract, but the incumbents of the office in the concrete. God assigned these men to their respective charges and activities, and equipped them for and sustained them at their work. In Acts 13:2 He states that He has “called” Paul and Barnabas for work among the Gentiles. And these men were to be separated unto Him, i.e., placed at His disposal to do His will. Hence we are told that the ministerial office is conferred upon its incumbents by the Triune God.
Scripture also explains the process by which this is done. At the appointment of Paul and Barnabas the congregation at Antioch, while engaged in worship, received a special order from the Holy Ghost, probably through an inspired member: “Separate unto me” etc. “Aphorisate moi.” The preceding verse states that there were in the congregation “prophets and teachers” and names five of them. From among these the congregation was to single out two for a special work to which the Lord had called them. The congregation is here called upon to appoint ministers whom God has already appointed. God and the congregation are to concur in the election of these ministers. A similar event is recorded in Acts 6:1-6: Seven deacons are appointed by request of the Lord; still they do not proceed to appoint the officers in question, but recognize the necessity of having the appointment made by “the multitude of the disciples.” They call upon them to look out seven among them to work among the poor. They state the qualifications for this work and an election, “exelexanto” takes place, followed by a solemn act of investing the persons selected with their new office. Both events have this in common: that the congregation actually conferred the office in question; the difference is only this that in the former instance, God Himself proposed the incumbents, while in the latter case the congregation did, however, under certain restrictions of the Lord. Thus certain
persons came to be ministers, not by an act of God alone, nor by an act of the Church alone, but by a concurrent action of both. In this wise the danger was circumvented of parties practicing imposition upon a congregation, by claiming to have been called by the Holy Ghost, and also the other danger of prostituting the sacred office by the admission of unworthy incumbents. In the matter just shown elders and overseers of Christian congregations were appointed in the course of time throughout Asia Minor, Acts 14:23; 20:17, 28; 1st Peter 5:1; 2:4. Hence we hold that the ministerial office is conferred upon its incumbents by God through the congregations. In order then that a person may publicly preach the Gospel and administer the sacraments, it is necessary that he be called to this work by a congregation. The call of this congregation is the call of God, a divine call, for three reasons: 1) it is issued by divinely conferred authority through persons who are properly vested with that authority; 2) it is issued in obedience to God’s commands and asks the party called for like obedience; 3) it is issued for divine ends. Such a call cannot be issued to a woman. A woman may be entrusted with the performance of other functions within a congregation, agreeable to her sex, but two reasons forbid her from entering the ministry: 1) the divinely ordained superiority and authority of husbands over wives, 1st Corinthians 14:34. This relation would be destroyed if a woman were to hold an office in which she must constantly guide, instruct, correct and direct men; 2) the peculiar domestic duties, likewise divinely ordained, for which woman was created and which she must not set aside. The call to the ministry delegates or transfers to the person called the public exercise of the functions, which are the spiritual privileges of the parties calling. These, viz., the believers, are a royal priesthood, a society of spiritual rulers, governors and worshippers of God. They are commanded to proclaim the Word of God and apply it to particular persons. These functions the called minister is required to exercise in public and in behalf of the entire body of Christians who have called him; and in so doing he represents 1) Christ, from whom all authority within the Church is derived. He is conscious of being the minister and servant of Christ in his entire activity and may demand to be regarded as such, 1st Corinthians 4:1; Romans 1:1. Yea, he may with Paul claim divine appointment, for the parties calling him would have had no power to vest in their minister had it not been given them by Christ, Galatians 1:1. 2) He represents the Church. The same apostle who claims to have received his office neither of men nor by man, nevertheless styles himself and his fellow ministers servants of the congregation, 2nd Corinthians 4:5, and makes the congregation sovereign over its preachers, 1st Corinthians 3:21. However, always with this limitation, “for Jesus’ sake.” Ministers are servants of the congregation, because Christ has called them through the medium of the congregation. In serving the congregation they serve Christ, and only so far can they serve the congregation as by so doing they serve Christ.

§165. Ordination.

It is the call issued by the Church that makes a certain person a minister, nothing else. No act can be substituted for the call as equally authoritative, nor need the call be supplemented by some further act to make it valid. The call confers the office completely and effectually. However, from
apostolic times, the Church has considered the occasion when the sacred office is given over to an incumbent to be of sufficient importance to be solemnized in a formal manner. The chosen candidates were placed before the congregation, a prayer was addressed to God in their behalf, and the ministering elders laid their hands upon the candidates in the gesture that expresses the bestowal of a blessing, Acts 6:6; 13:3. And this ceremony has come to be called ordination.
It was adopted by the Church in apostolic times, because Paul warns Timothy to be cautious whenever called upon to ordain a person, 1st Timothy 5:22. This text also indicates what the apostles regarded as valuable in this rite: since no person was to be ordained of whom the Church was not sufficiently assured that he was both competent and worthy to be vested with the sacred office, the ordination was a public declaration of the fitness of the candidate. Thus understood, a person’s ordination could be employed later as a means to urge him to display zeal and diligence in the discharge of his duties, to cheer him whenever he would lag or become despondent. When Paul in 2nd Timothy 1:6 speaks of a gift of God which was in Timothy by the putting on of Paul’s hands, this must be understood of such gifts as that of prophecy, 1st Timothy 1:18; 4:14, which in those days was bestowed as a special gift. As there is no command in Scripture, which would make ordination a divine institution, so there is also no promise extant in Scripture regarding the effect of ordination. Ordination is not a sacrament. But on account of the ends which it serves, it should be esteemed a valuable ecclesiastical rite. Besides, the ends already noted, ordination serves to assure both the minister and the congregation that a legitimate call has been issued and has been duly and properly accepted. And the prayers offered up at ordination also avail for the future success of the minister’s work. In estimating the importance of ordination two extremes, accordingly, must be avoided: 1) that of the Papists, who pretend an absolute necessity for ordination, because they hold that ordination imprints a holy character on the person ordained and renders him capable of administering sacred things, especially of consecrating the elements in the Eucharist. 2) that of the Calvinists, who reject ordination as of no importance whatever. Lutherans hold that ordination in a case of necessity, i.e., whenever it cannot possibly be attained, may be dispensed with without prejudice to the candidate of the ministry and his work in a certain place, but that it argues levity to refuse ordination in any case when it can be obtained. See Smalcald Articles, “Appendix,” §69-70, Jacobs, page 350. Apology, VII, §10-13, page 215.

§166. Qualifications for the Ministry.

The male persons to whom the office of the ministry can be committed must possess certain indispensable qualities, the absence of any or all of which renders a person unfit for the ministry. These qualifications of a Christian minister are four:
1. Soundness of doctrine, Titus 1:9. His entire activity is that of a teacher of divine matters. He must know these matters as the “logos pistos,” the faithful or reliable Word of God, on which man’s faith is to be based. This Word He must “hold fast himself” (“antechomenon”), i.e., he must restrict himself in all his teachings to its statements, saying neither more nor less than the Word states. And as this Word meets
with doubt and opposition, as its statements are often wrested from their divinely intended and true meaning, he must know the correct sense of the Word. For only that sense is sound doctrine, all else is corrupt teaching. To this end the minister must have been taught sufficiently in the Word of God, and must continuously labor to enter into the full meaning of Scripture. The office cannot be entrusted to a person who is either uncertain about or contradicts teaching of Scripture. And whenever a minister finds that he can no longer accept a certain teaching of Scripture, and all possible efforts have been made to disabuse his mind of its unscriptural views, it becomes his duty to surrender his commission.
2. Aptness to teach. The minister must be “didaktikos.” This embraces aptitude and willingness to impart the teaching of Scripture. The great commission, Matthew 28:20, contains these words: “didaskontes autous tärein panta.” Paul, in his valedictory at Miletus, cites the following evidence to show that he has been a faithful minister: Acts 20:20; 27:31. Apollos is held up as an example in this respect, Acts 18:24-28. The chief occasions on which the minister’s aptness to teach are to be manifested are during preaching and catechizing to compel his hearers, even the most listless and obtuse to understand the meaning of the Scripture which he expounds. He must set forth plainly Law and Gospel, sin and grace, repentance and faith, justification and sanctification. He should never speak at random, but select one particular point of doctrine as his objective and aim every remark at that point. There are also private occasions on which the minister must speak: during confession, at the enrolling of communicants, at the announcement of marriages, during visitations of the sick, at private communion, at pastoral visits. On such occasions he must know how to discriminate between various minds and temperaments and to specialize a general truth of Scripture so that its application in a given instance is seen to be just and proper. Above all he must make the grace of God and the holy Gospel very sweet and dear to his hearers. If a minister finds that he is habitually confused in his public utterances, so that he is not and cannot be understood and listened to with profit, or if he is unwilling to serve as a teacher of God’s Word at all occasions, in season and out of season, he cannot hold that office in the Church, of which teaching is the very essence.
3. Blamelessness of life. “‘Anepilämptos’, qui apprehendi nequit, qui carpi non potest; ‘anenkätos’, qui non in ius vocari potest, inculpatus,” Wilke [Clavis Novi Testamenti philologica: usibus scholarum et iuvenum theologiae studiosorum accommodata. Dresden 1841]. Both terms refer to the minister’s conduct during his term of office. A blame is the statement of a moral fault against the person committing, e.g., sloth, indolence, as opposed to vigilance and alertness; giddiness and serenity as opposed to solemn-mindedness and gravity; self-will, irritableness, pugnaciousness, as opposed to patience; haughtiness, as opposed to affability and kindness; intemperance as opposed to frugal and sober habits; greed as opposed to liberality etc. The minister is to be the foremost Christian of the congregation. Scripture demands that he should be an example to the flock and warns against the awful consequences of giving offence. A minister may subvert all his teaching by his conduct; even a slight indiscretion may be damaging to the respect and confidence which are due him, while open and repeated offenses must cause his removal from office.
4. Honest report of them that are without. In one respect only the Church has been directed to be heedful of the opinion of worldly men, viz., as regards the life of its ministers. The world must not find just cause for censuring the followers of Christ, 1st Thessalonians 4:12; 1st Corinthians 5:12, 13. This rule is emphasized with regard to ministers, 1st Timothy 3:7; Acts 6:3. In the former passage the apostle adds a reason: “lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the devil.” Adam Clarke comments on this passage as follows: “He should be one, who had not been previously a profligate, or scandalous in life. Such a person, when converted, may be a worthy private member of religious society, but I believe God rarely calls such to the work of the ministry. They that are without are the Jews, Gentiles and the unconverted of all kinds.” (The Church in the imagery of Scripture is regarded as an enclosure such as a field or a vineyard, well-hedged or walled.) “‘Lest he fall into reproach’ means ‘lest he be publicly reproached for his former scandalous life’. By ‘the snare of the devil’ may be understood snares and temptations, such as he fell in and fell by before. This is called the ‘snare of the devil’, for as he well knows the constitutions of such persons and what is most likely to prevail, he infers that what was effectual before to their transgressing may be now; therefore, on all suitable occasions he tempts them to their old sins. Backsliders in general fall by those sins which they were addicted to previously to their conversion. Former inveterate habits will revive in him who does not deny himself and watch unto prayer (The Holy Bible, ad locum).” No doubt, it is in view of such a possibility that Paul exhorts Timothy, 1st Timothy 5:22, “Lay hands suddenly on no man,” i.e., exercise foresight and good judgment when admitting a person to the ministry and ordaining him. The record of a faulty and scandalous past life militates against that confidence which parishioners should place in their pastor and against the respect which all upright men show to a Christian minister. A guide who is notoriously weak and has been known to slip in dangerous places will not be trusted by travelers to conduct them safely.

§167. Equality of Ministers.

Scripture applies to the persons who work in the Christian ministry various titles, which are derived from some feature of their work. (See 1st Corinthians 12:28; Ephesians 4:11.) Scripture also acknowledges that ministers are variously endowed, 1st Corinthians 12:4, 8ff., that they are engaged in different administrations and operations, 1st Corinthians 12:56, and that they work with varying success, 1st Corinthians 3:6. But Scripture denies that a claim of superiority over one another may be set up on any or all of these grounds, 1st Corinthians 12:4-31; 3:5-23. Each worker receives his commission, his endowment and his appointment from the Lord through the Church and is accountable directly to his Lord and the Church. There are no grades in the ministry. All incumbents rank equal, the highest in gifts and in station with the lowest. Such terms as ‘presbyteros” and “episkopos” which might seem to indicate a particular rank, are plainly used as synonyms and interchangeably, Luke 20:17-28; Titus 1:5, 7; 1st Peter 5:1-3. In the days of Christ a peculiar practice had sprung up: the teachers of the Church posed before the people as church dignitaries and had invented and were wrestling over particular titles, which they claimed should be accorded them, such as “abi,” “rabi,” “mori,” father, teacher, master. The Lord
rebukes this practice as vain-glorious conduct and self-exaltation, and earnestly warns His disciples against imitating this practice. “One is your Master, and all ye are brethren,” He says. (See Matthew 23:1-12.)
For reasons of expediency the Church has divided her activities wherever this has been feasible among a number of workmen, partly in order that each part of her work may be most effectually performed, partly in order that peculiar gifts bestowed upon certain persons may be given a proper sphere of action and sufficient scope, so that the Church as a whole may derive the greatest possible benefit from them, partly for the sake of order and unity in the administration of such interests as are common to a greater number of Churches. The assignments of special work to a minister either in his own church or in a federation of churches, and the bestowal of a distinct title expressive of the nature of such work does not signify the creation of another office of superior rank, but serves merely as a reminder of his special duty to the incumbent. Our Church has declared her position on this matter in the Apology, Article XIV, “Of Ecclesiastical Orders,” page 217, and in the Smalcald Articles, “Appendix,” Part II, “Of the Power and Jurisdiction of the Bishops,” pages 348-352. Our Church opposes on the one hand, the hierarchical claims of the Roman Church, which sets up for its clerical ranks a graded jurisdiction by divine rights; and on the other hand, the Puritan bodies, who reject as unscriptural the establishment of particular functions and offices even by right that is human and for the sake of expediency.

§168. Assistant Functionaries in the Church.

The ministerial office has been instituted in the Church as a divine agency by which every possible spiritual want of men must be supplied. It must minister the grace of divine knowledge and of divine strength, both to the entire body of believers and to the individual believers. It must approach both sexes, every age and every station of man. In health and in illness, in prosperity and in want, in liberty and captivity, in peace and in war, at home and abroad the functionaries of this office must reach out after the souls of men. The variety and multitude of demands made upon this office may easily overtax the strength of one incumbent. Already in the first Christian congregation a predicament arose, through a conflict of pastoral duties, each of which required prompt and careful attention, but could not be discharged by the same persons and at the same time. Unless aid was secured, one or the other of the duties would have had to suffer. The method then adopted has become a precedent in the Church, and every succeeding difficulty of this nature arising within the Church has been solved in conformity with the example set by the Holy Apostles, Acts 6:2-6. No new office was ordained by God, nor was the one office already instituted divided into parts, but assistants were appointed for special duties by the congregation with the consent of their pastors. The first auxiliary office thus established was that of deacons, or almoner, dispensers of aid to the poor. This office was distinct from the “diakonia tou logou,” verse 4, the pastoral or preacher’s office proper. Also the apostles are called deacons, 2nd Corinthians 6:4; Ephesians 3:7; Colossians 1:23 (“ministers”) in a wider sense, namely in so far as their office laid it upon them to serve men, Romans 15:8.
The deacons chosen in Acts 6 were necessary as long as the members of the congregation had all their earthly goods in common. Seven deacons were elected, probably because each served one day of the week. When the congregation later became dispersed, the deacons gave themselves to the ministry of preaching, e.g., Philip, who evangelized Samaria, Acts 8. As they were assistants to the apostles, their qualifications were of a high order, 1st Timothy 3:8-13, and they were also ordained, verse 6. In the primitive Church the deacons assisted at communion, administered baptism, catechized and also preached; but the original function of the deaconship was distribution of alms, and for that reason also females were given this office, e.g., Phoebe, Romans 16:1, of whom Paul says that she “has been a succorer of many and of himself also.” “In the primitive Church the deaconesses attended the female converts at baptism, instructed catechumens, visited the sick and those who were in prison; and in short, performed those religious offices for the female part of the Church which could not with propriety be performed by men.” Besides the deaconship Scripture mentions, in a general way, that there are in the Church “differences of administrations,” “diaireseis diakonioon,” 1st Corinthians 12:5, i.e., a variety of properly authorized officers, and in verse 29 Paul mentions besides that of the apostles 1) “that of prophets,” who either had the power of foretelling future events, or were expounders of Scripture, which latter view is more probable and an accepted meaning of this term in the New Testament, 1st Corinthians 14:24ff. 2) that of teachers, “didaskaloi,” who instructed the young, for that is what the term usually denotes. We may also combine with the meaning the ancient office of the catechist. 3) That of the miracle workers who exorcised those possessed with the devil, and had other miraculous gifts. In Romans 12:7, 8 there are mentioned besides “diakonoi” and “didaskaloi” three other officers: 1) “ho parakaloon,” the exhorter who admonished the unruly or disorderly and comforted the penitent and the afflicted, hence, ministered to private and spiritual needs; 2) “ho metadidous,” the almoner, who seems to have taken the place of the original deacon, while the latter took up duties of a pastoral character, or became an attendant on the sick and infirm; 3) “ho proistamenos,” literally, the German “Vorsteher,” anyone placed at the head of affairs. In apostolic times, it is thought that this person had to receive guests and provide shelter for them, also see to it that the apostles and preachers in their journeys were received and cared for. All these offices were created by the free choice of the congregation and were always subordinate and subservient to the one office instituted by God, the minister office proper, which was always kept distinct from such auxiliary offices, 1st Timothy 5:17 (“especially they”). With the change of times and conditions these auxiliary offices have changed and will always be changed with the varying needs of the Church. We have now in local congregations the offices of assistant pastors, school teachers, Sunday school teachers, elders, trustees, and in the church at large the offices of chaplains at hospitals, of president, chaplains at orphanages, homes for the aged and city infirmaries, professors at colleges and seminaries. All these offices are erected, changed or abolished to suit the needs of congregations for the time being, and serve only the end of making the ministerial office proper most efficient.

§169. The Validity of Ministerial Functions.

All ministerial acts aim at producing or strengthening spiritual life (repentance, faith, sanctification). This aim is realized through the minister’s agency but not on account of it. True, Scripture ascribes the saving of men to the efforts of the minister, 1st Timothy 4:16; Romans 11:14; 1st Corinthians 9:22; James 5:20. Confer James 1:21; 1st Peter 1:23. However, these statements merely say that Christian ministers are engaged in no meaningless pursuit, that their functions are not mere perfunctory performances or a ritual, not empty ceremonies but effective operations. Their effectiveness, however, is derived from a power that is outside and independent of the minister. The minister is an “ambassador to Christ,” 2nd Corinthians 5:20, clothed with the authority of the Lord. He is a servant of Christ, through whom Christ operates; he is a steward, placed in charge of his Lord’s goods, and is able to supply wants only because his Lord has provided the necessary bounty for those wants, 1st Corinthians 4:1; Romans 1:1. Again, the minister is the duly authorized representative of the Church to which have been given the Keys of heaven. The God-given power of the Church is imparted to his official acts. Neither the keen logic of his reasonings, nor his eloquence, nor his boldness makes his actions efficient (1st Corinthians 3:21-25: Paul, Apollos, Cephas), nor anything within the range of purely human and natural qualities (“or the world,” “or things present”) but this fact, that he acts as a chosen representative of a society which has been enriched spiritually with every blessing that the sinner needs (“all things are yours”). Lastly, the minister wields efficient and approved tools in his workmanship, viz., the all-powerful Word of God, both in the Law and in the Gospel, and also in its connection with a visible element in the sacraments. These are called means of grace, for the reason that they are divinely appointed instruments for that very end for which the ministry exists. Compare §133-137. On these three grounds the individual minister can rest assured that his acts are valid and productive of the ends which God desires. Therefore, Paul, basing on the call which he has received delivers over to Satan and actually forgives sins to a member of the Corinthian congregation, and expects that the assembled congregation will acknowledge these acts as having been performed for them, 1st Corinthians 5:3-5; 2nd Corinthians 2:10.
By this teaching we refute at the same time the error of the Donatists and the Roman Church, who make the efficacy of the means of grace and the validity of ministerial acts dependent upon the personal faith of the party administering or performing them. Christ had denounced the false teaching and the unbelief of the Scribes and Pharisees in the strongest terms; still He recognizes that they occupy a place of authority and that whatever they do by this authority and in accord with the Law of God, commands the respect and the obedient acceptation of the hearers, Matthew 23:2. The functionary in any ministerial act contributes nothing from his own store of wisdom, or virtue, to the validity and efficiency of the act, but the act is valid and efficient in itself, regardless even of the unworthy character of the functionary.

§170. Erring Churches.

The visible Church, i.e., the people who are gathered about the public administration of the means of grace, is divided into a true or orthodox (§160) and a false Church. The term false, used in this connection, is not employed by way of absolute contradiction, as when used over and against the church of the Mohammedans, but privatively, in the in the sense of impure, corrupted, vitiated or erring. The Churches in Galatia, in the days of Paul, had become contaminated with a most fatal error, which affected the heart of all saving doctrine, that of justification. They attempted to reestablish the ancient Mosaic ordinances as necessary to salvation, Galatians 4:10, 11. Paul warns them that they are under an evil spell, Galatians 3:1 and goes so far as to declare that Christ has become of no effect to them and that they are fallen from grace, Galatians 5:4. The Church at Sardis had sunk into great carnal security; John declares that the church has a name that it lives, but is dead, or ready to die, Revelation 3:1-3. In the Church at Laodicea the same apostle reproves the members together with their pastor for their indifference and their undecided character, Revelation 3:14-18. Instances of this kind might be multiplied and a research extended beyond the boundary of Scripture into the domain of Church history [which] would show that other churches have likewise become subject to error. In fact there is no visible Church, composed of frail human beings, who are naturally prone to error and subject to passion, that is absolutely immune from error. Whenever any particular visible Church enjoys the reputation of orthodoxy, that is never a personal merit of its members, and cannot become an occasion for them for self-glorification. Rather does the warning of the apostle to him who stands apply to such a church, viz., it should beware lest if fall. And this warning is reinforced by the examples of the Asiatic Churches mentioned in Revelation. Inerrancy cannot be claimed for any particular visible Church-body. And when any such body is called an orthodox church the force of the appellation is merely this, that the Church is free from error at the time being, but not this, that it can never err.
How are the operations, the church-activities of erring bodies of Christians with that of their pastor to be viewed? Do errorists still deserve the name of Christians and their organizations that of churches? Must their ministerial acts be respected? The answer is plain from the instances adduced before: Paul still calls the grievously erring people in Galatia “his brethren” and their organization “churches,” Galatians 1:2. John speaks of the society of Christians at Sardis and Laodicea in the same manner and also accords to their bishops their full official title and dignity, when he addresses them as the “angels of the Church,” i.e., the messengers, the authorized representatives and functionaries of the Church. This is done not because error is an indifferent matter; on the contrary, when the apostle says: “A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump,” Galatians 5:9, he declares even a slight admixture of error in the body of truth to be a most dangerous matter. No honor and respect, no toleration is due to errorists and erring churches in so far as they have embraced and are championing error, but for that reason they must rather be opposed and resisted. But honor and respect is due at all times to the Word of God, even when it is put forward in connection with error. In such a case we must separate the error from the truth. And when a church, though addicted to erroneous teachings still retains, by what might be called a fortunate inconsistency, the essentials of the Gospel, the preaching of the redeeming work
of Christ, it is to that extent and for that reason a church, its members are ministers of Christ, and its administration of the means of grace is valid, and must be recognized as such by Christians.

§171. End and Aim of the Ministry.

When Paul states that God gave apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers, he also names the divine purpose for which this was done: “Pros ton katartismon toon hagioon eis ergon diakonias, eis oikodomän tou soomatos tou christou.” Luther’s rendering of this text is most excellent: “Dass die Heiligen zugerichtet werden zum Werk des Amtes, dadurch der Leib Christi erbauet werde,” Ephesians 4:12. “The saints,” “the very body of Christ” are the invisible Church, the justified believers, singly and collectively considered. For these the ministry exists; they are to be fitted for service, by which the body of Christ is to be built up. The administration of the means of grace is to qualify them for every good work of faith and love. The Christian ministry, however, does not operate only where men are already Christians, but also prior to their becoming such. The Christian minister labors to “gain” men for and to keep men with Christ their Savior, 1st Corinthians 9:19-22. This is the grand aim, and this is obtained on the basis and in the order of the ordo salutis.
1. The proximate aim of the ministry is to effect in the unbelieving that change, which is called regeneration and conversion in the strict sense, and which is accomplished in the moment that faith in Christ, acceptance of the Gospel offer of pardon and salvation, is wrought in the sinner. This change was produced in Corinth among those who heard Paul preach the Gospel, and on that account Paul claims a spiritual fatherhood toward the converted Corinthians; he declares that he has “begotten them through the Gospel,” 1st Corinthians 4:15, and when the converted Galatians threatened to throw aside his teachings he was again in anxiety and painful concern for them, which he describes as “travailing in birth again until Christ be found in them,” Galatians 4:19. Through the work of the ministry, then, children are born to God in Zion, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible seed of the Word. The Christian ministry quickens those spiritually dead in trespasses and sins into new life. Its activity illumines the darkness of the world that lieth in wickedness, enlightens the mind of men, determines their will in favor of divine things and gives all their affections a new bend.
2. The ministry attends those who have been converted in their daily renewal and sanctification. Its care is that the spiritual believers might be joined individually in the unity of faith, that the immature knowledge of the early stage of faith may be ripened and strengthened, so that the Christian may stand his ground against the deceptions which [are aimed] to work upon him, and that all may be firmly compacted by truth, mutual love and peace into a brotherhood, in which each member places his spiritual graces at the service of the other, Ephesians 4:13-16. While in the former instance, the aim of the ministry was to extend the Church without, the aim in this instance is to strengthen it within. The Christian minister is the assistant of the heavenly gardener in the work of pruning and watering and tending the plants which the Father has planted, so that each may experience hearty growth and bring fruit
according to the measure of the grace bestowed upon it in every kind of Christian virtue.
3. The aim of the ministry is finally to save the believers, 1st Timothy 4:16; 1st Corinthians 1:26, i.e., to continue its attention to each converted soul to the end of its temporal life, and thus become a means to the Christian, in the midst of all the dangers and temptations with which he is beset, and to persevere faithfully until he gains the crown.
Small and insignificant in a reasonable view, are the means which are employed towards these ends: “the foolishness of preaching” but the ends being so transcendently great and glorious, the humble agents and means (puny and frail are also the agents whom the Lord employs, short-sighted, sinful mortals) which are employed toward such ends become all the nobler. The persons who wield the instruments of grace, if they rightly understand the value and nature and purpose of their calling, are the most remarkable company of men on earth. In the entire catalog of human pursuits there is nothing that can compare with the greatness and usefulness of the calling which sets out and labors persistently to save the souls of men eternally.

§172. The Church Militant and Triumphant.

This glory is indeed not fully manifest on earth. The Church exists in a twofold form: one terrestrial, the other celestial. So long as her members are still in the flesh the Church presents the aspect of an enemy in the panoply of war, Ephesians 6:10, 11; 1st Peter 5:8, 9, and waging war upon the devil, the world and the flesh, each of which, in its own way, strives to destroy faith in the heart and therewith overthrow the Church. This war is not a passing misunderstanding, not a slight skirmish; but it is an incessant, continuous and intense dashing and clashing of two essentially hostile powers, who must remain unalterably hostile to one another, as long and whenever they exist along side of one another. In a multitude of forms wrong and evil are ever approaching the Church, and hence, the Church must be perpetually vigilant, perpetually armed and perpetually combative in every direction. There is no truce and no treaty of peace between the Church and her foes on this earth: The Church in the present life is always a church militant and meant to conquer and to overcome, 1st John 5:4; James 4:4; John 15:18-21; 16:23.
But with the consummation of all things the Church enters into a state of glory and becomes a Church triumphant. This state exists even now, and is enjoyed by all those of her members who have died in the faith, and have been removed from Christ’s Kingdom of grace to that of glory. Her condition in that state is an eschatological subject and will be discussed in its place, §185.

§173. Predestination and Salvation of the Elect.

It has been observed that the operations of the Gospel are subject to many vicissitudes among sinful men, and that at times they fail to produce the effect intended by God. When we consider the universal and complete depravity of the race, we are forced to acknowledge that we can conceive no reason why the Gospel, if it ever fails of its purpose, should not fail in every case. Again, when we consider that in His plan of
salvation God has made ample provision for the full restoration of every sinner, we can discover no reason why the Gospel should fail of its purpose in any case. Why there should be different effects when the antecedent causes and conditions are the same, that is a matter which passes our comprehension. Any attempt to explain the inequality of the effect in given instances by denying, in one way or another, the equality of the antecedent causes and conditions must be a pronounced failure. Such attempts have been made a) by fatalism, which pronounces the salvation or non-salvation of a sinner a matter of chance; b) by synergism, which denies the universal and total depravity of the race; c) by Calvinism, which denies the universality and equal efficiency of saving grace. These attempts at explanation, while apparently removing the existing difficulty, create new and greater difficulties; for each involves a distinct contradiction of Scripture. Fatalism overthrows the doctrine of the sovereignty of the Godhead, and that is a matter of the most vital interest to every mortal; synergism destroys the doctrine of original sin. Calvinism attacks the doctrine of divine grace, of the atonement and of the efficacy of the means of grace. Under these circumstances it would seem the part of wisdom, even from a purely reasonable point of view, to offer no explanation whatever rather than an explanation, which after all does not explain. The mere fact that various and contradictory explanations have been adopted for the same matter is an indication that the parties attempting the explanation have not had a common guiding principle, but have followed each his own notion and have disregarded Scripture either entirely or in part. By so doing they waive the right to have their explanations considered as parts of sacred theology. Their views really belong to the domain of metaphysics or philosophy. The theologian can regard them only as negative quantities, as hostile elements, which it is his theological business and vocation to defeat. The legitimate task of the theologian is not to unravel mysteries, but to reiterate Scripture and nothing but Scripture. It is theologians whom Peter addresses when he says: “If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God,” 1st Peter 4:11. If such a reiteration of Scripture is found, in the end, to yield what the mind of men regards as a contradiction, it is no function of the theologian to reconcile the contradiction. He cannot speak where the oracles of God are silent.
Scripture states that neither the damnation of the lost, nor the salvation of the saved is a matter of chance, but there is a known reason for either; the former is due to men’s resistance to the Gospel, while the latter is due to the guidance and disposition of God’s grace, Mark 16:16; Matthew 23:37; Ephesians 2:4-6. Scripture states that no person’s damnation is willed by God, and that no person’s salvation is willed by man, 1st Timothy 2:4; 1st Corinthians 2:3. Scripture offers no explanation on the question why one person should be saved rather than another. It does state, however, that those who are saved have been elected to that end. The various operations in the hearts of those who ultimately enter heaven are shown to be the execution of an eternal decree of God. “Before the world began,” 2nd Timothy 1:9, God entertained a definite purpose with regard to those individuals who should attain to everlasting life. This “purpose of God,” Romans 9:11 is also called “the good pleasure of his will,” Ephesians 1:5, “the counsel of his own will,” Ephesians 1:11. This purpose of God was not prompted by considerations of His justice, reinforced by the omniscient knowledge of God. For in that case the divine
purpose must present a twofold aspect, one towards those whom God perceives and acknowledges as obedient, and the other towards those whom He for the same reason, perceives and acknowledges as disobedient. This would virtually be an anticipation of the final judgment at the end of the world. Scripture connects as the moving cause with the eternal purpose of God only His grace, 2nd Timothy 1:9, and His love, Jeremiah 31:3. Moreover Scripture denies that in conceiving this purpose God was guided by a consideration of the work of men: He neither purposed to save a person on account of his good works, nor did He purpose not to save a person on account of his evil works, 2nd Timothy 1:9; Romans 9:11. The term “foreknowledge of God,” 1st Peter 1:2 and “foreknow,” Romans 8:29, accordingly do not signify a complaisant acquiescence of God in events which are shaping themselves without His active (acquiescence) disposition, but they are synonyms with the terms “purpose and grace,” “good pleasure of his will,” “counsel of his own will,” and signify an effectual knowing on the part of God, which produces those very results, which God foreknows with purpose and as already accomplished because He desires them (nosse cum affectu et effectu; confer Matthew 7:23: “I never knew you”). The act resulting from this “purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will,” Ephesians 1:11, is therefore called summarily, “the election of grace,” Romans 11:5. The purpose of God was, however, guided by the consideration of a certain merit; but that merit was not in the human beings who became effected by the divine purpose, but in Christ Jesus, 2nd Timothy 1:9; 2:10; Ephesians 1:3, 4, 5; 1st Peter 1:2. These statements compel us to regard the salvation of Christ as antecedent to the divine purpose of saving certain men. In other words, God did not purpose first to bring certain men to heaven, and then determine that Christ should by His meritorious work render the execution of this purpose feasible; on the contrary, the decree that Christ should become the Savior of the world precedes in the divine mind the gracious purpose of God to bring certain redeemed persons into heaven, and constitutes the ground and basis for the gracious purpose.
Scripture employs a number of synonymous terms to describe the action, which God according to His eternal purpose took in behalf of those persons, who are to enter heaven. These terms are a) electing or election and choosing, Romans 9:11; 1st Peter 1:2; 2nd Thessalonians 3:12. These terms imply that God singled out certain persons from the mass of mankind, Matthew 20:16; John 15:19, in other words, that the gracious purpose is particular, not universal. b) predestinating, Romans 8:30; Ephesians 1:5, which implies that in His gracious purpose God fixed a certain end or ends, which must be unalterably attained, Mark 13:22. c) foreknowing, Romans 8:29; 1st Peter 1:2, which imply that God has acted wisely and unerringly in this matter. d) ordaining, Acts 13:48, which implies that God meant to carry out His purpose in an orderly manner and method. e) preparing, Romans 9:23, which implies that God’s purpose was intended to accomplish a complete result. All these terms denote and describe the same act as seen from different view points.
The gracious election, or predestination, or foreknowledge etc. of God embraces the entire ordo salutis, or application to the elect of every stage of the way of salvation. From the election of God flows the call of the elect, Romans 9:11; 2nd Timothy 1:9; Romans 8:28, 30; election is a cause of the faith of the elect, Acts 13:48; Ephesians 1:5; Romans 8:30;
3:26; election prompts the sanctification of the elect, 1st Peter 1:2; Ephesians 1:4; election secures the preservation of the elect, 2nd Thessalonians 2:13; Romans 8:28; Mark 13:22; election brings about the glorification of the elect, Romans 8:30; 2nd Timothy 2:10. A person’s election, then, does not establish for him a separate and privileged way to heaven, distinct form the common way appointed for all men, but it is the strict enforcement of every stage of this way. Any teaching on the subject of election, which would land sinners in heaven by a different route than that which is commonly expressed by the three terms: repentance, faith, sanctification, presents an election that is foreign to the Scriptures.
The gracious purpose of God by which He elected sinners to be saints is not carried into effect without means. Being an act of grace it is applied to men by the appropriated and appointed means of grace, the Gospel and the holy sacraments in their common and ordinary efficacy, 2nd Thessalonians 2:13, 14; 1st Peter 1:2; Ephesians 1:9. The elect are not warranted to expect that their conversion will be effected by an immediate interposition of God: they cannot slight preaching and the Word, or make light of baptism and the Lord’s Supper, pretending that these are matters which do not concern them as they do others. God saves no one by the use of His mere power and by an absolute decree. He binds the elect to derive their spiritual life and increase with all the rest of mankind from the common source of all spiritual thought, the means of grace.
The practical use of the doctrine of the gracious election is to offer and afford comfort to the sinner. This doctrine is altogether Gospel; it proclaims the immense love of God, His untiring zeal and persistent endeavor to bring about the sinner’s perfect salvation. In a world of spiritual pitfalls to faith, it brings to the sinner the assurance, that God in His mercy has so minutely considered his particular case as to provide the necessary aids and safeguards against every danger, to reclaim him from every error into which he may have been enticed through his natural weakness or wantonness, to support him under every cross, to render even his tribulations occasions of divine blessing to him and to make him a conqueror over the combined legions of hell. There is no terror, not the faintest muttering of God’s anger in this doctrine; it breathes nothing but peace and consolations and helps to fix the yearning eye of faith upon the glorious heritage beyond, which the eternal and unfailing counsel of God has made secure for His elect evermore.
The only way for an individual Christian to console himself and assure himself of the fact that he is one of the elect of God is his present state of grace, his union with Christ through faith, the gracious guidance which has so far been vouchsafed him in his Christian sojourn, and which will not be withdrawn from him for that portion of it which still lies ahead. The grace which he has received in the past must be an evidence to him, that God has begun to carry out His eternal purpose of grace with regard to him, and will continue to do so until the goal is reached. The examples of time-believers, of such who have become backsliders, the question about the salvation of the Gentiles who have not received the Gospel, must not be permitted to enter in between himself and his gracious Savior. The mystery which hangs about the lives of men and nations, God’s ways and dealings with men, which are inscrutable, will be all lighted up in due time.

§174. Eschatology.

Man’s ultimate fate becomes unalterably fixed, either in a happy or in a miserable state, not in this but in another life. All the matters which Scripture has revealed concerning the departure of the individual out of the present life and his entering into eternity, also concerning the concluding acts of God’s dealings with the human race and the termination of the present order of things in the universe are called “the last things” (novissima, “eschata”), and the department of dogmatic theology, which presents these things in a systematic form, is called eschatology. Of subjects which concern the individual man (microcosm) the chapter on eschatology embraces two topics: temporal or physical death, §175-178; and the state after death, §184, 185; of subjects which concern all men and all things (macrocosm) it embraces two also: the resurrection of the dead, §180, 181; together with their final judgment, §182; and the consummation of the universe, §183. Certain events which Scripture has indicated as tokens of the approach of the ends of all things are also treated in this connection, §179.
Quenstedt says in passing over to the chapter on Eschatology: “We have so far considered the means of salvation properly so-called…. Now follow means in a wider sense, viz., the four last things…. which are not so much means of obtaining salvation as rather the way (via) by which we proceed to the goal or the terminus ad quem.” Gerhard says: “Four things are commonly enumerated as the last things and they are embraced in this distich: Mors tua, iudicium postremum, gloria coeli… et dolor inferni sunt meditanda tibi. The last things, in a general view, are twofold by means of a twofold subject matter (obiectum): 1) those of the macrocosm; 2) those of the microcosm. The last thing relating to the macrocosm is the consummation of the universe; there are four 1st things relating to the microcosm: 1) death; 2) the resurrection; 3) the judgment; 4) the eternal sojourn, viz. of the blessed in heaven and of the damned in hell.”

§175. Temporal Death.

The term death is taken in a literal and in a figurative sense. Literally understood it signifies the termination of natural life (natural, physical, temporal death). Figuratively used it denotes precursors of bodily death, or the spiritual death of believers to sin, to the Law, to the world; and of unbelievers to the true life of the soul, which is in God; or the eternal death of the damned, the second death, Revelation 2:11; 20:14.
The form of death, that which constitutes death, is the separation of the soul from the body, the rupturing of the essential bond which has united the two parts of man’s essence. The soul was bestowed on the lifeless substance, which the Creator had formed into the body of man, as a distinct element, and though the two are united in a living human being, they must always be regarded as distinct from one another. Adam antequam a Domino formatur, est mortua et iacens gleba; eam apprehendit Deus it format inde pulcherrimam creaturam participem immortalitatis (Luther). Scripture keeps the two parts of the human essence distinct, when it predicates mortality of the body only, Matthew 10:28; Romans 8:19, 21. That which is interred at a burial is a “natural
body,” 1st Corinthians 15:44. The resurrection from death is accordingly referred only to the body, Romans 8:11, where the phrase “quickening the bodies” is exactly synonymous with “raising up the dead” in 1st Corinthians 15:35. Of the soul, however, Scripture predicates immortality, Matthew 10:28. Hence God who “is not the God of the dead, but of the living” calls Himself the God of Abraham long after the patriarch had died and been buried; for according to his soul Abraham continued to live even after his soul had left the body, Matthew 22:32. The soul of man accordingly, is not reduced to nothing in death, but it is required, demanded back (“zpaitein”) by Him who gave it, Luke 12:20. The Savior indicates by the use of this term that the soul is, as it were, a foreign element and was bestowed upon the body only for a time. When the soul obeys the summons of God who requires it, it departs, 2nd Timothy 4:6; Philippians 1:23 (“opanachoorasis”). Hence there is in death a local separation of substances, which were locally divided before. The soul becomes “absent from the body,” 2nd Corinthians 5:8. “Mortis essentia, si accurate loqui volumus, constitit in sola ‘lysei’, sed eius necessarium consequens est ‘diastsis’,” Quenstedt. Paul views the body 1) as an inn, in which the soul has taken up a temporary lodging; 2) as a garment which the soul has put on for its sojourn on earth. This inn is wrecked, “katalysis,” this garment is put off (“okdysis”) in death, 2nd Corinthians 5:4, 8.
Baier, accordingly, defines death as “privatio vitae hominum naturalis, ex dissolutione animae et corporis proveniens.” Death is a quid privatum, when held against life. It is the absence of life from a subject that was fitted for life and at one time had life. And the life of which we are speaking is always the vita naturalis seu animalis, and death in this connection is always mors corporis.
Strictly speaking, and per se there cannot be any causa efficiens of death, because death is not something positive, but merely a privatio. However, there are causes producing the dissolution of the soul and body, and these causes are partly moral and physical.
Among the moral causes of death there is to be named 1) the devil, who is called a murderer, “anthropoktonos,” homicide, John 8:44. He became the cause of death, because he is the cause of that which brought on death – sin (causa causae mortis seu causa causati). By his deception practiced on Eve, he brought into the world sin and therewith the guilty state of death (mortis reatum). That our first parents were created immortal, and became mortal afterwards in consequence of sin, has been shown in the chapter of anthropology. The Book of Wisdom (2:24) therefore says: “Through envy of the devil came death into the world.” In Hebrews 2:14, the devil is said to have “to kratos tou thanatou,” mortis imperium, somewhat like a tyrant who disposes of men whom he has conquered by consigning them to death.
The second moral cause of death are the protoplasts, Adam and Eve, who by yielding to the persuasion of the devil brought death upon themselves and their posterity.
The third moral cause of death is God, however, only insofar as He is the just Judge, who according to His vindictive justice (Strafgerechtigkeit) imposes on men this punishment for their sin, that the original donum immortalitatis shall be taken from them and a reatum poenae, the death penalty shall be visited on them.
The phenomenon of death, so far as its cause is concerned, baffles the philosophy of men. No man studying this subject by the aid of his reason only, not even the most skilled physician, has been able to show conclusively, why men must die. Only Scripture reveals the cause of death.
By the way, if we examine particular and concrete instances of dying, we may discover the fact that the moral cause of death varies greatly: sometimes the party dying is himself the particular moral cause of his death, e.g., Saul, 1st Samuel 31:4; Abimelech, asking death from his armour-bearer, Judges 9:54; Paul going to Jerusalem with the expectation of dying there, Acts 21:13; King Josiah exposing himself to be killed, 2nd Chronicles 35:20; sometimes other men, like robbers and highwaymen, David ordering the killing of Uriah, Absalom that of his brother Ammon; people allowing a mad bull or a wild beast to attack and kill persons, or inciting them to this as was done at gladiatorial shows at Rome; or by creating mortal dangers for men; sometimes the good spirits, as in the case of Herod who was mortally smitten by an angel of the Lord, Acts 12:23; sometimes evil spirits, as in the devil’s attempt on the life of Job (1:9), sometimes the dying jointly with the spirits, as in the death of King Ahab in the battle with the Syrians which was brought on by his believing the false prophets, who had advised him to begin that war, and who in turn were instigated by Satan, 2nd Chronicles 18:2, 19ff. Hence it is said (Baier) that the causa (impulsiva) of death may be multiplex or composite.
The physical causes of death have been divided into causae naturales, praeternaturales and violentae. Following Aristotle, Baier describes the natural cause of death as the drying up of the humidum radicale, the life-sap in man, and the extinction of his calidum nativum, his natural warmth. This sounds almost puerile; however, medical science even in our advanced age has not been able to add any essential point to the description of the physical cause of death. In a natural way this physical cause operates when the life-sap and warmth are consumed and exhausted by old age; in a preternatural way, when this occurs through diseases, such as “febris, hydrops, phthisis, pestis, aliique morbi.” In a violent way, when this occurs through some death dealing res externa, e.g., “telum mortiferum, ignis, aqua,” entering the seat of life in a human body, or through the withdrawal of the means of nutrition by which life is maintained in a human being.
The subiectum mortis, or the materia in qua of death, are homines omnes, per carnalem generationem propagati. This excepts the supernaturally conceived Christ. The case of Enoch and Elijah are exceptions to the rule resting on divine omnipotence, and the transformation of the survivors at the last day is something analogous to death.

§176. The Death of the Wicked.

Death was not embraced in the original plan of God regarding man. The divine threat in Genesis 2:17 would be fortuitous, if prior to that there would have been a physical necessity for death in the essence of men. In the passage cited God evidently announces a punishment, for which there would have been no reason and no occasion outside of the state of sin. And the death of which God speaks is not external death only, but everything that falls under the designation of death. “Quam ob causam vocabulum mortis duplicatum et ‘morte morieris’ a Domino dictum esse, recte existimant theologi,”
Meisner; (“Moth tamuth”), ‘thou shalt surely die,” E.V., “du wirst des Todes sterben,” Luther. Accordingly, death was considered conditioned upon a contingency: it “entered into the world” as something novel and foreign; when sin entered it was passed on from generation to generation, even as sin was propagated from parent to child, Romans 5:12, and obtained a universal dominion over the human race, Romans 5:17, 21, because it was the consequence of sin, upon the commission of which it had been conditioned. It follows then that God cannot be called the cause of death in any sense other than this, that as the just Judge He inflicts it upon the transgressors of His righteous Law.
And this death comes to be viewed correctly not only as a natural effect, but as a positive punishment of sin. God does not say: “The soul that sinneth, it will die,” as if relating a bare fact, but He utters a decree: “it shall die”; “for his iniquity that he has done,” Ezekiel 18:20-26, “by his iniquity,” Ezekiel 33:18, “he shall die.” Death is “opsoonion täs hamartias,” Romans 6:23, the pay which the mercenary soldiers receive for their service in the war which the originator and leader of all wickedness wages against God. Death is the expression of the consuming anger of God, Psalm 90:7.
When this punishment is inflicted it affects not only the body, but also the soul of man. The spirits of disobedient people are confined in prison, 1st Peter 3:19, 20, i.e., in hell, in that place, far removed from the place of everlasting comfort, where obdurate sinners are in endless torments, Luke 16:23. And this endless death of the soul, this endless death, occurs in the moment of physical death, Proverbs 11:7; Ecclesiastes 11:3. These texts plainly state that death affects no change in the disposition of the heart of the person whom it overtakes, but carries him off in the condition in which he finds him. It follows, that there is no change after this life. “In whatever disposition or state of soul thou diest, in that thou wilt be found in the eternal world.” “Hope was not made for the wicked and yet they are the very persons that most abound in it. They hope to be saved and get at last to the Kingdom of God, though they have their face to perdition and refuse to turn. But their hope goes no further than the grave. There the wicked man’s expectation is cut off and his hope perishes,” Adam Clarke.

§177. The Death of Believers.

Inasmuch as faith in Christ has affected a decided change in the condition of a sinner and in his relation to God, the death of a believer has also a different meaning from that of an unbeliever. It is like the latter only in so far as the death of the believer is also the consequence of sin. The fall involved the ruin of the race; death, its consequence passed upon all men, Romans 5:12. However, the full power of this spell is broken in the believer already in this life. This is done by the grace of God which is offered to this dying world, as the antidote against man’s death-bringing offenses, Romans 5:15. This grace the soul grasps and holds already in the present natural life and is thereby rendered immune from death spiritual and eternal. But as grace works no physical effects it leaves the body still subject to death. This body which is the external agent of man’s sinning, the apostle pronounces dead, i.e., sentenced to death and therefore as much as dead, and he adds the reason: “because of sin”; however, he adds also a limitation: “but the spirit is life because of righteousness,” i.e.,
the justified believer has been planted by the Holy Spirit into a new life which death cannot affect, Romans 8:10 (confer verse 6). It is only the physical form of death to which the apostle looks forward with a somewhat painful sensation, when he represents himself as “groaning and being burdened in this tabernacle,” viz., in his mortal body. This body will soon be destroyed, and he will be unclothed in order to be reinvested with a new body. He would prefer, if he could have his wish, to be clothed upon forthwith, without having to pass through the unclothing process, in order that mortality, what there is still mortal in him, might be swallowed up of life, might all at once and instantaneously be transformed and transferred into the future state of the glorified bodies, that tabernacle, which is not made with hands, which is eternal in the heavens, 2nd Corinthians 5:1-4.
Accordingly, temporal death has lost its punitive character to the believer. This is due to the vicarious death of Christ. The wounds, bruises, chastisement and stripes, the entire passion of Christ, which culminated in His death on the cross, were suffered for us in this twofold sense: 1) they were substituted for ours, we having deserved them and being the cause why they were inflicted upon our Representative, and 2) they have brought us a release from the real death, they have secured our peace and our healing, Isaiah 53:5. When Christ offered His body on the tree as a sin-offering for the world’s trespasses, sinful man became dead to sin and alive to righteousness, 1st Peter 2:24, or what comes to the same thing, alive to Christ. Paul, therefore, says: “Emoi gar to dzän christos,” i.e., to me living means Christ. He is the strength of my life, and the object for which I live. I have no reason why I should desire to be in this body of flesh and in this world, were it not that I can here serve Him who gave Himself for me. And this explains why the apostle can add: “Kai to apothanein kerdos.” Death is gain to him, because the sooner it comes, the sooner it brings him to Christ, which latter he regards as “polloo mallon kreisson,” very much better than to stay in this world, Philippians 1:21, 23. Yea, the believer breaks forth into a song of gladness at the thought of his approaching death. True, he knows that he has been a prodigal, but he knows also that his peace has been made with his Father, and he longs to depart on that last long journey which will bring him home. He departs in the peace of Christ. The cross of the Redeemer blesses his dying hour, and is his rod and staff of comfort in the valley of death, Luke 2:29; Psalm 23. To a believer death brings a most happy change. It releases his soul from its cage, the body of this death, in which spirit and flesh have waged to many fierce battles, where a law of sin which dominated his members of flesh has brought into captivity also the spirit, which Christ had made free and had caused him frequently to hang his head with shame and beat his breast with remorse of his ever-recurring slips in the paths of holiness and truth, Romans 7:23, 24. Death cuts the fetters, and permits the soul to soar upward, as on eagle’s wings, free from sin and free from sorrow, grief and crying, Romans 7:23, 24. All these things belong to the former life in the body, and are passed away in the hour of death, Revelation 21:4.
The believer’s life on earth was spent in hope of a fruition of that coming bliss promised him, [though] that hope had not been realized. His hours and days in the flesh were spent in patient waiting and homesick yearning for the sight of all those things which his faith had grasped, Romans 8:24, 25; 2nd Corinthians 5:7. This time of longing and suspense closed
in the dying hour, when faith terminates in the vision beatific and hope settles down to the enjoyment of its fulfilment.
Then the life that knows no end and is blessed, i.e., replete with joys and pleasures, begins, Revelation 14:13, in paradise, Luke 23:43; Revelation 2:7; 2nd Corinthians 12:4, in the presence of the Lord, 2nd Corinthians 5:8; Philippians 1:23, who receives and welcomes the returning spirit, Acts 7:59; Ecclesiastes 12:7.
This change, this transition is instantaneous; the dying believer is blessed “aparti,” forthwith, Revelation 14:13, just as the dying unbeliever is miserable from the moment of his last breath.
There is, then, no intermediate state either for believers or unbelievers. The advocates of a sleep of the soul, which is said to ensue after death and to last until the day of resurrection, mistake the force of the term “sleep,” and “rest,” which Scripture applies to the dead; they refer to the soul what is said only of the body; they misinterpret the parable of the laborers in the vineyard, Matthew 20:8, and refer to the future world what is said with reference to the present, Psalm 6:5; 115:17. They commit absurdities which the reason of gentiles has even rejected. “Si quispiam ita nonaginta annos velit vivere, ut, com sexaginta vixerit, reliquos dormiat, ne suis quidem id velint,” Ciero. Luther, who is frequently quoted on the side of psychopannychism, says: “Anima autem non sic dormit, sed vigilat et partitur visiones, loquelas angelorum et Dei, confer Revelation 6:10, 11.” Those who hold that the soul of believers enters into a cool and tranquil state in which it has the foretaste of heaven, but not the perfect heavenly joy, can cite no Scripture in their defense. And those who hold that unbelievers are given an opportunity after death to reconsider and repent of their errors in this life contradict a plain teaching of Scripture.
Looking back once more to the two preceding chapters (176, 177), we feel it necessary to say something on the state of the soul after death. In a general way we may note that there are comparatively few positive statements in Scripture regarding the state and the condition of the soul in the interval between its departure from this earth and the general resurrection. It seems to have been the principal aim of the Holy Spirit to point the hope of believers to the last day, not to the time intermediary between a person’s death and his rising again. Accordingly, while we have hundreds of passages containing clear statements regarding the state of the blessed and of the damned after the day of judgment, we have few passages that state anything positively about the state of the (blessed and the damned) departed souls prior to that event. As usual, this meager information has been eagerly seized and elaborated [on], often in a grotesque manner. If a lesson is to be gathered from the limited amount of information furnished us on the state of the soul after death, it is this that God does not want us to enquire curiously into this matter. He has given us glimpses of the state of the soul in eternity, and these glimpses are indeed plain enough and valuable, so that we study them gladly and gratefully, but at the limits of divine revelation stop our inquiries obedient to God, who has withheld from us more. The soul is immortal, that is, it continues to live and exist after its departure from the body. And to live for the soul means that it continues its functions also when separated from the body. “Facta dissolutione… anima superstes manet et suis operati omnibus extra corpus seorsum fungitur.” This fact Scripture clearly states in two places:
Ecclesiastes 12:7: “Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return to God who gave it,” and Matthew 10:28: “Fear not them which kill the body but are not able to kill the soul.”
The thought of the immortality of the soul is, in a manner, conceivable on natural grounds as a possible, or even plausible fact. Accordingly we find philosophers in all ages, also in nations that have not had the Scriptures, discoursing on this matter, but in no case has man, guided only by the light of nature, been able to state anything reliable, anything that could serve as an immovable and permanent basis of men’s faith on this matter. This fact is expressed in the seemingly fatalistic utterance in Ecclesiastes 3:18-22, which words are plainly spoken from the standpoint of a certain philosophy that has always existed among men, not as coming out of the mind of God. In Cicero’s “Tusculanae Disputations,” near the beginning of the first book, Atticus is introduced, saying: “Delectat me illa sententia, posse animos, cum e corporibus excesserint in coelum quasi domicilium suum pervenire; idque primum ita esse, deinde etiam si non sit, mihi persuadere velim.” Marcus replies to him: “Quid tibi ergo opera nostra usus est? Nun eloquentia Platonem superare possumus? Evolve diligenter eius liberum, qui est de animo, amplius, quod desideres nihil erit.” Whereupon Atticus says: “Feci me hercule et quidem saepius, sed nescio quo modo, dum lego assentior; cum possui librum et mecum ipse de immortalitate animorum coepi cogitare, assentio omnis illa elabitur.” This same doubting and vacillating reasoning Cicero propounds in his Cato or dialog regarding old age.
As regards the activities of departed souls, while such activities must be granted, it is not good to deduce such activities by a process of reasoning from the essential qualities of the soul or from the power of the intellect and will which have their seat in the soul. Great caution is necessary not to say anything beyond Scripture, even as to what the immortal souls do in the hereafter. As a false view of the activities of the departed, we must reject the notion that the departed spirits may appear here on earth, since Luke 16:27f. states the contrary. Even Romanists deny that the souls of the damned can return to earth. In regard to the souls of the saints who dwell in heaven Dannhauer has constructed an elaborate but not always tenable argument, to show 1) that they cannot return. He refers to 2nd Samuel 12:23 for proof, where David says regarding the child, which Bathsheba had borne him, and which had just expired: “Can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me”; and to Luke 16:26, where Abraham says to Dives: “Between us and you there is a great gulf fixed; so that they which would pass from thence to you cannot; neither can they pass to us that would come from thence.” He infers from this test: “Si non ad damnatos, ergo nec ad mortales. Eadem ratio impossibilitatis utrobique; sordes cum illa sorte non miscendae.” And now he adds the following reasoning: The soul of a saint would have to appear either in its own, or in another’s or in a recently fashioned aerial body. But neither of these three possibilities can be realized: they cannot appear in their own bodies because it would not be either honorable or becoming for a soul in glory before the resurrection to pass into the confines of its body which is going to pieces and decaying, especially when that body has been buried for a long time. They cannot appear in the body of another, because this would be still less proper and would, moreover, defeat the very end of their appearing which is to
render themselves cognizable by their characteristic and peculiar lineaments and marks. And they cannot appear in an ethereal body, because the departed soul, lacking corporeal organs, could not, by its own power, set in motion substances distinct from itself. Dannhauer denies 2) that the saints in heaven must return, because these apparitions of departed souls would not be beneficial but harmful to mortals. In the first place such an apparition would not benefit the living, for, as Abraham says to Dives, if these latter do not believe their living fellowmen they will not believe either, if any came to them from the dead. Secondly, an occurrence of this sort might be the cause of many errors, inasmuch as a demon pretending to be the soul of a certain departed might deceive people. Dannhauer, furthermore, denies that the soul of a saint wants to return; for why should those who are free from all troubles and who enjoy the bliss of heaven serve mortals in order to receive from them the homage which mortals could render? Lastly, Dannhauer denies that any such return of a departed soul has ever taken place; for what is reported regarding apparitions of this kind may all be a work of Satan, who transforms himself into an angel of light and like a hyena imitates the voice of a shepherd in order that he may devour the sheep.
As to the appearing of Moses and Elijah at the transfiguration of Christ, most of our theologians hold that Moses had been raised from the dead by a special act of God, soon after his death and burial, and they see a hint of this fact in Deuteronomy 34:6, that nobody has ever found the grave of Moses.
Our Church has in the Smalcald Articles, Part II, II, §16, page 315, declared her belief regarding such apparitions as follows: “Evil spirits have exercised much wickedness, and appeared as the souls of the departed, and with horrible lies and tricks demanded masses, vigils, pilgrimages, and other alms. All of which we had to receive as articles of faith, and to live accordingly; and the Pope confirmed these things.”
Another false view regarding the activities of departed souls is that they have a distinct and definite knowledge of actions and affairs of individuals still living on earth, which have taken place after their departure, and that hence prayers and acts of worship must be addressed to them. Quenstedt propounds the following syllogism: “Whom we call upon in a religious way, he must be omnipresent, omnipotent and omniscient, and in him we must believe and hope. However, the saints are not omnipresent etc., and we do not believe nor hope in them. Ergo….” This syllogism he establishes in detail from a host of Scripture passages, thus reaching the conclusion that it is idolatry to pray to the departed. As to the claim that praying implies faith and hope in the party addressed, he cites the saying of Coelestinus: “Lex orandi est lex credendi et agendi.” With his usual caution, however Quenstedt distinguished between a notitia generalis et specialis of the departed souls, also between their recollection of past happenings and their knowledge of present conditions. He refers to the instance of Dives remembering his five brethren, and says: “Although in a general way the blessed know something about their state of the Church militant, in which they at one time served under the banner of the cross, and although they pray for the Church in a general way, still they are ignorant of the private miseries, cares, groaning and yearnings of each particular individual and hence in no position to help.” The Roman Church, has, in the decrees of the Council
of Trent and in the Catechismus Romanus made prayer to the saints and belief in their intercession (“ora pro nobis”) obligatory to its members. The only thing that a devout Catholic must be careful about, is that the saint to whom he prays in his public devotions has been duly and properly canonized by the genial gentleman in the Vatican Palace at Rome, who tends to this saint-making business. In his private devotion a Catholic may pray to any saint he chooses.
That the souls of believers after their separation from their bodies enter at once upon the fruition of every essential part of the bliss of heaven, while the souls of unbelievers at once are merged in damnation, is a belief which results necessarily from what we ascertained from our study of §176 and §177. As to the state of the souls of believers after death, Philippians 1:23 shows that the reason why Paul was wishing for this dissolution was that he might the more speedily be with Christ, that is, in the Kingdom of glory. To be with Christ certainly means to enjoy bliss with Christ. As to the state of the souls of unbelievers, 1st Peter 3:19 shows that the souls of men like the scoffers in the days of Noah were – upon their death – confined in prison, rejected from the face of the Lord and tormented with the pains of their proper punishment.
Quenstedt notes that there are three leading views regarding the state of souls after their separation from the body: 1) that they have no sensation or intelligence of any kind, experience neither joy nor sorrow, but are merged in absolute forgetfulness and, as it were, in a profound sleep. The defenders of this view have, accordingly, been called psychopannuchists. 2) that the soul of believers after death are kept in a cool and quiet place and enjoy a foretaste of the bliss of heaven, the complete possession of which, however, they will not attain until the day of judgment. 3)that the souls of believers immediately after death and before the general resurrection obtain the full bliss of heaven, which consists in the clear and intuitive vision of God. Koenig has called this bliss of the disembodied soul consummate secundum quid, i.e., in a manner. He holds that the bliss of heaven will be absolutely consummate only after soul and body have been reunited. Hence while the bliss which the soul enjoys will not be increased intensively at the resurrection, it will be increased extensively, inasmuch as there will be a glorified body which also obtains this bliss and shares it with the soul.
On the theory of the soul sleep we may say, in general, that if a sleep of the soul is conceived, that admits of no enjoyment of God and of heavenly bliss, the theory clearly contradicts passages of Scripture like Philippians 1:23; Luke 23:43. But if we speak of the soul sleeping, as Luther did, who declared that in this sleep the soul enjoys the divine fellowship, the expression at least need not be rejected. In commenting on the statement in Genesis 25 that Abraham was gathered unto his people, Luther says: “Die Heiligen liegen und ruhen fein sanft und in Frieden; wie in der Offenbarung Johannis [Revelation], Kap. 14:13 die Stimme vom Himmel solches bezeugt: ‘Selig sind die Titen, die in dem Herrn sterben, “ja”, der Geist spricht, “dass sie ruhen von ihrer Arbeit”’. Diese Ruhe ist zu der Zeit der Schoos Abrahams genannt worden, und am Anfang, vor Abraham, Schoos Adams. Denn die Heiligen, die der Verheissung Christi glaubten, sind alle gestorben, dass sie aus dem Jammer und von der Arbeit, so sie in diesem Leben gehabt, abgefordert worden und in ihr Kammer gegangen sind, dass sie daselbst schlafen und in Frieden ruhen sollten. Dies ist alles wahr und richtig, und koemmt ueberein mit der Schrift
und mit dem Spruch Christi, Matthew 22:32, dass Gott nicht der Toten sondern der Lebendigen Gott sei. Nun faellt hier aber wohl noch eine andere Frage ein, naemlich: Dieweil es gewiss ist, dass die Seelen leben und im Frieden sind, was doch das fuer ein Leben oder Ruhe sein moege? Diese Frage ist aber etwas hoeher und schwerer denn dass wir etwas Eigentliches oder Gewisses davon schliessen koennen. Denn Gott hat nicht haben wollen, dass wir solches in diesem Leben verstehen sollen. Darum sollen wir uns an dieser Erkenntnis und Verstand genuegen lassen, dass wir wissen, dass die Seelen nicht also vom Leibe ausfahren, dass sie in Gefahr, Quall und Pein der Hoelle kommen sollten, sondern dass ihnen ein Schlafkammer bereitet sei, darin sie in Frieden schlafen und ruhen. Es ist aber ein Unterschied zwischen dem Schlaf und Ruhe diese Lebens und des zukuenftigen. Denn ein Mensch, so in diesem Leben von taeglicher Arbeit muede geworden ist, geht, wenn die Nacht herbeikommt, in seine Schlafkammer als im Frieden, dass er daselbst schlafen soll, und hat die Nachtruhe, und weiss gar von keinem Unglueck oder Schaden, es sei gleich mit Feuer oder Totschlag. Die Seele, aber, schlaeft nicht also, sondern wacht und hat ihre Gesichte, naemlich Gespraeche der Engel und Gottes. Darum ist der Schlaf im zukuenftigen Leben tiefer als in diesem Leben, und lebt die Seele doch vor Gott. An diesem Gleichniss, so ich vom Schlaf eines lebendigen Menschen habe, lasse ich mir genuegen. Denn an solchem Menschen ist Friede und Ruhe, und er meint er habe kaum eine Stunde oder zwei geschlafen, und sieht doch, dass die Seele also schlaeft, dass sie gleichwohl auch wacht. Also geht die Seele nach dem Tod in ihre Kammer in Frieden, und indem sie schlaeft, fuehlt sie ihren Schlaf nicht, und erhaelt Gott dennoch die wachende Seele. Also kann Gott Elia, Mose und anderen erwecken und sie also regieren, dass sie leben. Wie geht aber das zu? Das wissen wir nicht. Wir lasssen uns genuegen an dem Gleichniss vom leiblichen Schlaf und dass Gott sagt, es sei ein Schlaf, Ruhe und Friede. Wer natuerlich schlaeft, der weiss davon nichts, was in seines Nachbars Hause geschieht; und lebt doch gleichwohl, ob er wohl wider die Natur des Lebens im Schlaf nichts fuehlt. Eben dasselbe wird auch in jenem Leben geschehen, aber auf eine andere und bessere Weise. Gleichwie derhalben die Mutter das Kindlein in die Schlafkammer traegt und in die Wiege legt, nicht dass es sterben, sondern schlafen und fein sanft ruhen soll: also sind vor der Zukunft Christi und viel mehr, da er nun gekommen ist, alle Seelen der Glaeubigen in den Schoos Christi gegengen und gehen noch hinein,” I, 1758-60. In his comment on John 1:11 Luther remarks: “Darum macht das Ende gar einen grossen unterschied unter dem Leiden der Christen und der Gottlosen. Denn ob sie schon beide gleich erstochen und umgebracht werden, so faehrt doch ein Christ von Mund auf in die ewige Freude, der Gottlose aber in den Abgrund der Hoellen,” VII, 1629. And when his friend Urban Rhegius had died, Luther, in announcing Rhegius’ exposition of the Old Testament prophecies concerning Christ wrote: “Desshalb sollen wir wissen, dass auch unser Urban, der fort und fort in rechter Anrufung Gottes und im Glauben an Christum gelebt und der Kirche treulich gedient und das Evangelium durch keusches und gottseliges Leben geziert hat, selig sei, und ewiges Leben und Freude habe in der Gemeinschaft Christi und der himmlischen Kirche, in der er jetzt das als gegenwaertig lernt, sieht und hoert, wovon er hier in der Kirche durch Gottes Wort gepredigt hat,” XIV, 145.
Dannhauer’s argument against psychopannychism is very severe but his grounds are overdrawn. Luther’s statement
is sufficient to explain the standpoint of our church on soul sleep to outsiders.
Frequently, the summoning of the spirit of Samuel by the sorceress at Endor upon the request of King Saul is used to light up the state of departed souls. Dannhauer defends the position that the apparition which the sorceress says she beheld was not the true Samuel, but someone impersonating the prophet. He offers the following reasons: 1) The being that appeared could not have been a prophet, for according to verse 6 God had ceased to speak to Saul through the living prophet; 2) it was a being that had enjoyed rest, for in verse 15 the apparition complains of being troubled and disturbed by the incantations of the sorceress; 3) it was a being who could declare that Saul and his sons would be with him the next day, i.e., not only in the same state but also in the same place; 4) the being permitted itself to be worshipped. Now Samuel was a prophet, he could not be disturbed in the eternal rest into which he had entered; he could not, without telling a falsehood, say that Saul, who died in a mortal sin by self-destruction would be with him, no matter whether we believe, as our adversaries do, that Samuel was in the limbus patrum, or, as we hold that he was in heaven; 4) Samuel would never have permitted anyone to worship him by prostrations to the ground. Dannhauer also constructs the following dilemma for his opponents: Either the apparition was the spirit of the departed cited by this foul sorceress, or he came of his own accord, or God sent him upon the incantation of the sorceress. Omnia absurde! Omnia impia! Dannhauer exclaims with regard to all these views. In the first place, how could it be that the demons, who were cast out from heaven, should have jurisdiction over the members of the Church triumphant in heaven? Secondly, it is incredible that the prophet who knew that necromancy was forbidden in the Law should have come of its own accord. Thirdly, it is blasphemous to think that God would disturb a soul in bliss to further a foul work which had been forbidden in the Law and which was worthy of hell fire, and to satisfy the curiosity of a wicked king. Against the argument that we must say, either that the Bible lies when it says that Samuel appeared, or that a prophecy can be uttered by other than divine power, Dannhauer proposes this answer: This does not follow at all; for Scripture even calls Baal God and yet does not lie on that account. He holds, accordingly, that the apparition at Endor was the prince of darkness assuming the mask of the prophet.
Regarding the condition of souls of persons who have died twice, like the daughter of Jairus, the young man at Nain, Lazarus, Dorcas, Eutychus, the Lutheran theologian Fecht held that it was not absurd that since their case was extraordinary and served to manifest the glorious power of God, they passed into an extraordinary abode upon their first demise, viz., into a status tertius. But why should anyone want to assume this extraordinary state? The power of God could bring them out of Heaven as well.
In our time the Lutheran dogmatician Hofmann has propounded strange views with regard to the state of the departed souls. He says in his Schriftbeweis: “Der Zustand der Toten ist ein gleichartiger an Leib und Seele. Wer ohne Hoffnung des Heils abscheidet, dessen Leib ist auch hoffnungslos dem Tode verfallen; wer in dem Glauben stirbt, dessen Seele ist in einem Zustande, welche dem Todeszustande seines verwesenden, aber der Auferweckung entgegen wartendes Leibes entspricht,” II, 480. Again: “Nachdem Christi
verklaerte Leiblichkeit das Haus Gottes geworden und die Gottgemeinschaft des Glaeubigen Gemeinschaft mit dem in verklaerter Menschennatur ueberweltlich lebenden Christus ist, hat der Christ die selige Gewissheit, dass sich seine Gemeinschaft mit Christo, wenn er aus dem irdischen Leben scheidet, –ndem himmlischen Hause Gottes fortsetzt. Selbst koerperlos, wird er den Leib, in welschem die Fuelle der Gottheit wohnt, zu seiner Wohnung haben. Hat Christus die seinen, solange sie durch die Beschaffenheit ihrer Natur von ihm geschieden waren, persoenlich in ihm, dem leiblich lebenden, leben lassen; so laesst er ihnen nun, nachdem sie ihrer Natur verlustig worden, die seine statt der eignen sein,” III, 434. Again: “Im leiblichen Tod hoert der Mensch auf, sich selbst zum Mittel seiner Selbstbethaetigung zu besitzen. Etwas anderes aber, als diess, ist weder was man den geistlichen noch was man den ewigen Tod nennt. Der leibliche Tod ist an sich ein Tod fuer immer, und dass ihm noch ein zweiter folgt, kommt blos davon, dass die Vernichtung des Stofflichen, welches dem Einzelnen zu seiner Selbstbethaetigung eignet, erst mit dem Ende aller Geschichte des Geschlechts, mit der Wandlung der gesammten koerperlichen Schoepfung eintritt,” I, 430.
It remains to say a few words about the Roman Catholic doctrine concerning purgatory and its modern Protestant parallel of Hades.
Scripture acknowledges only two classes of men, believers and unbelievers, Mark 16:16; John 3:18, the blessed and the cursed, Matthew 25:34, 41, sheep and goats, verse 33. Agreeably to this view Scripture records only two abodes for men after this life, heaven and hell, and a twofold state of the souls departing this life, heavenly bliss and eternal damnation, Luke 16:22, 23ff.; Mark 16:16. The Papists have constructed a most ingenuous receptacle for departing souls. It consists of five departments: 1) the infernum, to which are consigned the souls of extremely wicked persons, who have departed this life in unbelief, waywardness, graver offenses committed against their own conscience, and mortal sins. This is hell proper. 2) the purgatory, coming next to the infernum, to which they relegate the souls of such as have departed this life believing in Christ, but have not been completely purged from venial sins, and have not rendered complete satisfaction for their trespasses. These have to sweat in purgatory until they are purged from all stains of sins and then soar to heaven, clean and pure. 3) the limbus puerorum, or infantum, to which they consign the souls of the unbaptized infants, who have departed this life in original sin because they were not given the remedy of Christian baptism. These are afflicted in this cella subterranea by a poena damni non tamen sensus; they suffer no pains such as those in the infernum or in purgatory, but they suffer the loss of the heavenly joys. 4) the limbus patrum, into which they place the souls of the patriarchs and of all the saints in the Old Testament prior to the descent of Christ into hell. Owing to the debt incurred by original sin, which was not discharged until Christ by His descent liberated them and took them with Him to heaven. 5) Coelum, to which go the perfectly pure souls. The infernum, according to the Roman view is located in the center of the earth; next to it, somewhat like a second story, is the purgatory; contiguous to that the limbus infantum and close above that the limbus patrum. This last section is now vacant. The Papists are chiefly interested in Section no. 2, because they can do no business with no. 1 and no. 5, while no. 4 is empty and no. 3 is self-adjusting. With no. 2, they maintain quite an extensive commercial relation, they
seek to empty it for money. And the maintenance of this department is not only a goldmine, but a life-question for the Roman Church, for it becomes bankrupt the minute purgatory is put out of commission. Luther knocked huge holes into this section no. 2 with the hammer that rang on the Wittenberg Church door, and Rome sent its theological master-carpenter to repair the damage. – Anvil of Trust. – Faith of our Fathers. – The theologians of the Roman Church are not agreed on many features of their purgatory, e.g., on the place, the duration, the punishments, but they all believe that the fire, by which the souls are being purified is a real and true fire, of the same quality as our element. And the sufferings in purgatory are most shocking, not comparable to any suffering in this life. Between the pains of purgatory there is a great difference – as between being fried like an apple and being struck by a person’s breath; and the sufferings of the soul far exceed the worst suffering which we can conceive the body of undergoing in this life. Bellarmine declares that most Roman theologians declare the fire of purgatory to be identical with that of hell.
Modern theologians, also within the nominally Lutheran Church, have assumed that besides heaven and hell there is an intermediary place and state, in which unbelievers have another opportunity to be converted, and believers, to be purged from the remnants of sin, which still cling to them when they died. This intermediary state the theologians in question find indicated in the Hebrew “Sheol” and in the Greek Hades. Luthardt propounds this Hades-theory in the most cautious and at the same time comprehensive manner. He says: “Verwandt mit den heidnischen Anschauungen vom Hades, als dem Ort der Abgeschiedenen, schattenhaft lebenden Seelen, teilweise verbunden mit der Idee der Vergeltung lauten die alttestamentlichen Aeusserungen ueber das Scheol…. Das N. T. nimmt zunaechst die a. Tliche Anschauung vom Hades in entwickelter Gestalt herueber, so im Gleichniss Luke 16:22ff. In diesen Hades nun ging Christus selbst mit seinem Tode, aber er ist zugleich im Paradies und mit ihm der Schaecher, Luke 23:43, und nimmt die a. Tlichen Frommen mit sich aus dem Hades, Matthew 27:52f. Seitdem kommen die Glaeubigen nicht mehr in den Hades, sondern als selige und vollendete Geister, Hebrews 12:23, in den Himmel zu Christo, 2nd Corinthians 5:6-8; Philippians 1:23; Apoc. [Revelation] 7:9ff., zur seligen Ruhe, 6:11; 14:13, – waehrend der Hades seine Toten erst am Ende herausgibt, um dann nicht mehr zu sein, Apoc. 20:13f…. Die Dogmatik laesst, ungeschichtlich, die Entscheidung mit dem Tode schon voellig abgeschlossen sein. Die Frommen kommen alsbald in den Himmel, die Gottlosen in die Hoelle…. Seit der Zeit des Pietismus kann aber die Lehre von einem Zwieschenzustand wieder auf und wurde in der neuen Zeit beliebt, wobei es sich noch besonders um die Fragen der Zwischenleiblichkeit, der Entickelungsfaehigkeit und Bekehrungsmoeglichkeit und der Moeglichkeit vollendeter Heiligkeit handelt,” Kompendium der Dogmatik, Seiten 290, 291, 293. Kahnis writes: “Somit haben wir Grund in jener Welt einen Mittelzustand anzunehmen, in welchem noch eine Entscheidung moeglich ist fuer die, welche in dieser Welt sich noch nicht entschieden haben. Auch nach mittelalterlichen Anschauung gibt es zwischen der Hoelle und dem Fegefeuer uebergaenge. In der Idee des Fegefeuers aber liegt unzweifelhaft eine Wahrheit, naemlich, dass fuer viele Christen noch eine Laeuterung noetig ist. Gross ist die Zahl von Christen, von denen man nicht sagen kann dass Christus ihr Leben ist. Aber sie haben doch einen Zug zu ihm und bekennen das, was
sie von ihm erkannt haben, in einer Lauterkeit, Selbstlosigkeit, Treue des Wandels, welche viele Christen, die Staerker in Worten als in Werken sind, nur beschaemen kann. Soll fuer sie keine Hoffnung sein? Nicht klein ist endlich die Zahl von Christen, die, soweit Menschen urteilen koennen, in wahrem Glauben stehen, aber deren Glaube noch stark versetzt ist mit dem Schlacken des alten Menschen, so dass man urteilen moechte, dass sie so, wie sie sind, nicht ins Paradies kommen koennen, wenn das Paradies bleiben soll. Man sage nicht, dass mit dem Leibe auch viel vom alten Menschen abfallen werde. Warum laesst man den Glaeubigen zukommen, was man den Unglaeubigen nicht zugesteht? Die Eigentuemlichkeit eines Menschen laesst sich nicht mit einem Zauberschlag beseitigen. Wie soll einem Christen, dem es an Liebe fehlt, durch den Tod auf einmal ein Strom der Liebe werden? Und so muessen wir wohl annehmen, dass in jener Welt noch fuer Laeuterung und Entwickelung Raum ist. Sonach wuerden in jener Welt drei Orte und mit ihnen drei Zustaende zu unterscheiden sein: der Strafort (“phylakä”), der mittlere Ort der Entscheidung und Laeuterung, und der Freundenort (“paradeisos”),” Die lutherische Dogmatik, [Verlag Dörffling & Franke, Leipzig 1874–75,] Band III, Seiten 553ff.
In meeting this modern piece of fiction it is necessary that the theologian make a thorough study of the Hebrew term “Sheol” and the Greek term Hades in our Bible. (See my article in Theol. Quarterly for 1906: “Sheol passages in the Old Testament” [Theological Quarterly, Volume X, Number 1, January, 1906, pages 22-33].) It will be seen from a close study of all the pertinent texts that both terms are used in a few places to denote the state of having departed this life and having entered the state of death (Todeszustand). Especially when the O. T. saints like Jacob and David speak of descending into Sheol they express the certain expectation that they will die. In such passages the exact condition of the departed in the beyond is not taken account of; it is simply declared, as we would say: He has entered the great beyond. But in a majority of all available texts both Sheol and Hades mean hell pure and simple. The rich man in Luke 16 is in Hades, and if his Hades is not hell – what is? When Christ assures His disciples that His Church will outlast all her foes, He puts it thus: “The gates of Hades shall not prevail against her.” According to Luthardt and Kahnis the people who are being refined in Hades and fitted for the Lord’s Kingdom of Glory would then be found fighting against the Lord’s Kingdom of Grace after death more violently than before their death. It should be noted that Luthardt cites no passages to prove that Christ in the hour of death descended into Hades to bring out the O. T. saints. His descent, which by the way occurred after His revivification, was to the “phylakä,” and there He found only unbelievers like the scoffers in the days of Noah. Peter, quoting Psalm 16, concerning His death and burial, quotes these words: “Thou wilt not leave my soul in Hades (sheol), neither shall my flesh see corruption,” but that is plainly nothing more than a comprehensive description of the state of death into which Christ had really entered. The statement in Revelation 20 concerning Hades giving up its dead expresses the general resurrection. All the dead on that day come out of their Todeszustand – are raised.
The evil part of this entire theory is that which makes Hades a post mortem possibility of conversion, and the state in Hades virtually a means of grace. Considering the imperfect condition even of Christians, upon which Kahnis builds up his specious argument, we would have to say, that in the end more
people were corrupted in Hades than on earth. In fact, on the ground on which Kahnis declares a Hades necessary, we may safely say that it is the only place where a person could be prepared for heaven. The best Christian is not such a conceited fool as to believe himself perfect in holiness when he dies. Hence on Kahnis’ argument no person could go to heaven directly from this earth. We know that the daily sins of believers are merged in the daily prayer for forgiveness and covered by the righteousness of Christ. These need no purgatory. And unless the others are not offered in Hades a different Gospel, a different grace, a different Christ, a different baptism, a different eucharist, a different Bible, a different via salutis, viz., by repentance and faith than the one which they opposed and rejected here on earth, it is difficult to see how they can be converted in Hades. This theory of Kahnis makes the whole work of the ministry here perfectly nugatory and puts out of commission that host of Scripture texts, which limits a man’s time of grace, day of grace, accepted time, time of visitation span of life and makes his spiritual condition in the hour of death to determine his condition in the hereafter.
Since death not only ushers the soul into its eternal state, but also necessitates the disposition of the remaining corpse a few words on burial will be in order.
Corpses of human beings should be placed in the earth, “cum honore sed absque luxu immoderato et superstitiosis ritibus,” says Baier, in order that they may then be reduced to ashes. Baier does not favor casting bodies into the water, or cremating them, or exposing them to be devoured by beasts, all of which forms of disposing of corpses are known to have been in practice among pagans and may still be practiced. He finds a God-pleasing mode of disposing of human corpses indicated when Scripture speaks of God’s people as sleeping in the dust, Daniel 12:2, or as being planted in the earth like seed corn, 1st Chronicles 15:57. He also notes that the Scripture regards this mode of putting away a human corpse as a lex communis.
Gerhard points out that the pagan rites of treating the bodies of [the] departed show how truly the apostle spoke, Ephesians 2:12; 1st Thessalonians 4:13, when he said of these people that they have no hope, viz., no hope of the resurrection of the body unto life everlasting, and that it is proper that in the Christian Church the bodies, especially of departed believers are treated with more honor. He points out how much God makes of burial in the ground, because the Holy Ghost, Ruth 1:8; 2nd Samuel 2:5 calls such an act “dealing kindly with the dead” and our Lord, Matthew 26:9 calls the anointing of His body at the banquet in Simon the leper’s house “a good work,” because it had, as it were, prepared Him for burial. Gerhard defends internment, i.e., putting bodies in the earth on the grounds: 1) on account of the divine decree: “Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return,” Genesis 3:19; also on account of the statement in Daniel 12:2: “Many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth,” and Ecclesiastes 12:7: “Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was.” 2) on account of the titles given to the earth, which in Sirach 40:1 is called “the mother of all things,’ because it receives the bodies of the dead into its bosom, and keeps them until the day of judgment which in Matthew 19:28 is called the day of regeneration. 3) on account of the comparison which Christ and Paul have instituted when they call the bodies of the interred “seed-corns,” John 12:24; 1st Corinthians 15:37f., which are sown into a field, which on that account is called God’s acre, and when the seed ripens
until the final harvest of the Lord. 4) on account of the example of God’s saints which have been recorded for our imitation, Genesis 23:19; 50:13 etc., show that this mode of internment is a most ancient custom among God’s people, and Deuteronomy 34:6 shows that God Himself followed it at the burial of Moses. 5) on account of the hallowing of our graves by the burial of Christ. Christ suffered death on the cross on our account, and in like manner he was buried, that by His rest in the tomb, He might sanctify our graves and make them ‘bath chajim,” a house of the living, and a “koimätärion” (cemetery), i.e., a dormitory. Accordingly, as we have been buried with Christ spiritually in baptism, so we should be buried like Him in order to conform to Him also in this respect.
These arguments certainly state a rule, but the rule is not absolute. While we should not feel justified in view of these Scripture testimonies to call interment an adiaphoron, we must not deny that owing to imperative circumstances the disposal of human corpses may also be in other ways, e.g., by cremation. What has arrayed the sentiment of Christians against cremation is the known infidel character of its first and foremost defenders as the only proper mode of disposing of corpses, and the untenable, often flimsy grounds on which it has been advocated.
There is an exhaustive composite article by many (26) authors (“Death and the Disposal of the Dead’) in E. R. E., IV, 411-511.

§178. The Last Generation.

From the universal law, by which all men are subject to death, two have been excepted in the past, namely Enoch and Elijah, and still more will be excepted in the future, namely those who are alive and remain on earth at the second coming of the Lord. The apostle says concerning this last generation, 1st Thessalonians 4:15-17, that they shall not prevent (“ou mä phthasoomen”) them which are asleep, i.e., they shall not have an advantage over the dead in reaching the state of glory before them, for the latter shall be raised first, and after that, the persons living at that time shall be changed and shall see with their natural eyes the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven (Matthew 24:30) shall be caught up together with the risen dead in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. They shall be raised bodily from the ground, as Elijah was at his transfer to heaven, and probably Enoch also. This implies that their bodies shall have received new qualities, and are no longer subject to the laws governing matter. The apostle states this fact plainly 1st Corinthians 15:31: “We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed.” Here he denies that the bodies of the last generation of men will pass through death into that spiritual and heavenly state which begins with the resurrection, and affirms that they will nevertheless be made like the bodies of the resurrected by means of a sudden transformation (“allagäsometha”). Soul and body will not be separated in order to be reunited in the new state, but by an extraordinary act of God, which the apostle pronounces a mystery, the last generation will find itself instantaneously clothed upon with the bodies of the new life. This change does not consist in wearisome and painful suffering, as if some misfortune were befalling these persons and something similar to the dissolution of soul and body were taking place in them, but in the
termination of their mortal or animal life and their entrance into another life and state, body and soul meanwhile remaining united by their essential bond. A change of this sort is altogether analogous to death, but has not the form of death, for if it had that, it would be death itself, Baier. This author thinks that Enoch and Elijah underwent the same change at their departure.

§179. The Signs of the Last Times.

The second coming of Christ to which the last paragraph alluded is a subject that must rouse the intensest interest of all men. For in one way or other, every person is concerned in it, since Christ will come at His second appearing as the Judge of the quick and the dead. The fact of His return is plainly stated in Scripture, which describes the returning Christ now according to His human nature (Son of man, Matthew 24:30; 25:31; 26:64; Mark 13:26), now according to the divine (“the Lord,” 1st Corinthians 1:7; 1st Thessalonians 4:16, “the great God,” Titus 2:13). The God-man, “this same Jesus,” Acts 1:11, who lived and died on earth and rose again, shall return. And His return is preeminently the concluding act of salvation, which He has wrought, for the Scriptures call the returning Christ significantly “the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ,” Titus 2:13. However, His return is a saving act only to those who “look for that blessed hope,” viz., for the life everlasting, which He has promised to His believers. The phrase “the sign of the Son of man,” Matthew 24:30, is best interpreted as the Son of man, the very Christ Himself, not the sign of the cross. The genitive is a genitive explicitus. The returning Christ will be a sign to the world. When He makes His appearance in the splendor of His celestial body, riding upon the clouds, with the retinue of the angels’ host about Him, and the blare of trumpets sounded before Him, 1st Thessalonians 4:16, that will be a spectacle, a sign, the meaning of which no mortals will fail to understand. Scripture describes the return of Christ as a “coming,” Matthew 26:24; Acts 1:11 etc.; a “descent,” 1st Thessalonians 4:16. These expressions signify that the return takes place in space and implies locomotion. However, Scripture also calls the return an “appearing,” Titus 2:13, which indicates that the return will be sudden and instantaneous, not a slow movement or a gradual descent. Accordingly, in Matthew 24:30 “appearing” and “coming” are used as synonyms. The “clouds of heaven,” Matthew 24:30; 26:64; Mark 13:26, in which He shall come, cannot be clouds that will conceal Him, but such as will reveal Him. There is no reason why we should not regard them as real clouds as on former occasions, but bright and shining, and will exhibit the presence of the Lord, of whom Scripture says that He rides upon the clouds as upon a chariot and robes Himself in clouds as in a garment, Isaiah 19:1. Accordingly, the statement of the angels at the ascension of Christ: “He shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven,” Acts 1:11, expresses merely the visibility of the event. That is the tertium comparationis in this place. The invisible God-man shall enter the vision of human eyes, Luke 21:27, every mortal shall behold Him, who was pierced by human hands in His last suffering, Revelation 1:7; John 19:37. The wicked men, who refused to believe on Him and who would fain be spared this sight, shall be forced “to look at him.”
The date of Christ’s return has not been revealed, either to angels or to men, Matthew 24:36. When Christ made this statement in the latter passage He revealed incidentally the depth of His voluntary humiliation in the days of His flesh, for He states that in this state He had abdicated the use of His divine omniscience to such an extent that He was Himself ignorant of the day and the hour of the last judgment. Human reason cannot fathom the depth of this exinanition. All attempts to fix the date of the return of Christ are therefore futile, and history has recorded many such sad attempts with their disheartening failures. On the other hand, Scripture warns men not to commit another folly, namely, to argue from the delay of Christ’s coming that He will not come at all, 2nd Peter 3:3ff., or, not soon, Matthew 25:48. For Christ’s return may be expected at any moment, and Scripture exhorts men to “watch” (“grägoreite,” Matthew 24:42; “agrypneite,” Luke 21:36). “Grägoreoo” is from “egeiroo,” to rouse, and signifies to be wide awake, alert, like a sentinel on duty, who is constantly on the qui vive against approaching danger. “Agrypneoo” seems to be derived from “ageiroo” and “hypnos” and signifies to be sleepless. Both verbs enjoin Christians not to give themselves over to security, lest they be taken unawares, but to practice sobermindedness and to cultivate prayerful intercourse with God. Luke adds: “en panti kairoo,” at every season, and Matthew affixes this reason: “for ye know not what time your Lord cometh.” This indicates that the second Advent is close at hand. Accordingly, Luke urges men in another place to be “ready” (“ginesthe hetoimoi”), Luke 12:40, like travelers who may receive the word to march at any moment, and he adds this reason: “the Son of man cometh at an hour when ye think not.” The attitude of Christians is therefore described as one of wistful expectancy, watchful waiting, “apekdechesthai,” waiting, 1st Corinthians 11:7, “looking for,” Philippians 3:20, “prosdechesthai,” Titus 2:13, “prosdokah,” 2nd Peter 3:12. The first two Greek verbs express the readiness to receive and to lay hold of something, whenever the opportunity arrives, the last verb expresses careful preparation by forethought.
God has added force to these warnings by fixing certain signs which shall herald Christ’s return. It was an act of mercy when Christ spoke to His inquiring disciples regarding these signs, Matthew 24:3-33; Mark 13:39. He told them of signs in nature, such as eclipses of the sun and floods. Though these signs have been in progress all the time, and can, in part, be computed prior to their happening, they do not on that account lose their significant meaning. The fact that a physician is able to diagnose a disease does not destroy the mortal character of that disease. Moreover, the manner in which the Lord speaks of the signs in the heavens and in the sea, and upon the earth, indicates that towards the end these common signs will occur with unusual frequency, as if to forewarn men of the approaching general collapse of the created universe. Christ has also pointed to a state of despair which seizes upon men in consequence of these signs, Luke 21:26. Great general unrest, perplexity, the frequency of suicides and insanity and like indication of a disturbed condition of the mind are in themselves a sign of the impending Second Advent. A still more significant sign is the rise of pseudo-Christs and pseudo-prophets, Matthew 24:24, and the success which they have in deluding great numbers of men, 1st Timothy 4:1. This does not refer to common heresies, but to attempts to impersonate Christ or the prophets of Christ. While this sign assumes the
appearance of great religiousness and piety, there shall occur at the same time a sign of the opposite character, namely great profligacy, sensuality, as in the days preceding the Flood, Matthew 24:37-39. Also the destruction of Jerusalem, Luke 21:24, 25, the dispersion of the Jews and their remarkable preservation in spite of the fearful persecutions which they have had to endure, Matthew 24:34, and the spread of the Gospel preaching throughout the world through missionary efforts, Matthew 24:14, are given as signs of the coming of the Lord.
One important sign is the revelation of Antichrist. John refers the Christians of his day to this sign saying: “Ye have heard that Antichrist shall come,” 1st John 2:18. This statement refers to the prediction in Daniel 11:36ff., and to the apostle’s own teaching; but also to Paul’s statement in 2nd Thessalonians 2:9, which was very likely written before the Epistles of John. “The words following, ‘even now there are many antichrists’ are intended as an endorsement of the prophecy concerning the one great Antichrist. John means to say: “The opposition to Christ and the teaching of the Gospel has begun as foretold; we behold many heretics who contradict Christ; this opposition will continue and become concentrated and embodied in the one great Antichrist, of whom Daniel and Paul have spoken.” 1st John 4:3 the apostle therefore states: “This is that spirit of Antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world.” In his Revelation, chapter 17:18, John has described the revelation of Antichrist. Paul has called Antichrist the “man of sin” and “the child of perdition,” who will occupy the temple of God and proclaim himself God, i.e., he shall declare himself to be the head of the Church, and in Christ’s place, and he shall exalt himself over all that is divine, i.e., over all divine institutions, the parental authority, the civil magistrates etc. Thus Antichrist is found in the attempt to execute the same ambitious scheme which Satan attempted at the beginning. At the same time Antichrist will oppose God’s Word and ordinances and introduce new teachings and support them with delusive miracles, 2nd Thessalonians 2:3ff. The entire description in Daniel’s, Paul’s and John’s writings is such as to indicate that the full development and overthrow of Antichrist will consume a longer time than the common life of a certain individual. Therefore, Antichrist is not so much a person as an institution; however, at the head of the institution is an individual, in whom the entire antichristian character and tendency of the institution becomes concentrated and personified, and who is the exponent of the antichristian system. All the characteristics of Antichrist are plainly visible in the Roman hierarchy with the pontiff, the pope, at its head, who calls himself the vice-regent of Christ, declares himself the infallible teacher of the faith of men, seeks to dominate the powers that be, deprives men of the oracles of God, changes the holy sacraments, institutes idolatrous forms of worship and practices deceptive miracles. Until the days of George Calixt and our modern theology, Protestant theology was nearly a unit in professing the Roman papacy the Antichrist. The statement and argument of our Church regarding this matter is found chiefly in the Smalcald Articles in the Appendix: “Treatise regarding the power and primacy of the Pope”; also in Part II, Article 4, §10-14. Compare Apology, Article VII and VIII, §23, 24.
Baier defines Antichrist 1) “as series and complexity of a number of men, who succeed each other in the same kind of wickedness, arrogate to themselves a peculiar rule in the
Church of Christ and an almost divine power, have their seat principally in the city of Rome, introduce various corruptions of the doctrine and public worship of Christians, and propagate them by frauds and much violence and also by persecuting the confessors of the true faith, all of which they do in such a way that their impiety is at least made public and manifest and reproved, and at the coming of Christ to judgment, this Antichrist is to be abolished.” The word “antichrist” in 1st John 2:18, Baier holds, is employed in a general sense, but in 2nd Thessalonians 2:3ff. he finds the term more specially used – “kat’ exochän.” The twofold understanding of the term can be found also in our Apology: “The kingdom of Antichrist is a new service of God, devised by human authority rejecting Christ, just as the kingdom of Mahomet has services, and works through which it wishes to be justified before God, nor does it hold that men are gratuitously justified before God by faith for Christ’s sake. Thus the Papacy also will be a part of the kingdom of Antichrist, if it thus defends human services as justifying,” Chapter VIII, Article XV, §18, Jacobs, page 220. It has been customary, too, to call the antichrists in 1st John “antichristi parvi,” and the one in 2nd Thessalonians “antichristus magnus.” A distinction has also been made between the oriental antichrist, Mahomet, and the occidental antichrist, the Roman pope. The remark in 2nd Thessalonians 2:4, that Antichrist sits in the temple of God, pretending to be God, has led Luther to say: “Proprie loquendo et definitione dialectica est antichristus, qui in ecclesia sedet.” Besides these chief marks of Antichrist the following are enumerated: 2) assuming the name of a servant of Christ, or of Christ’s vicar or vice-regent, Antichrist is an adversary of Christ (“antikeimenos”), and exalts himself above everything that is God or is worshipped as such; 3) the doctrine of Antichrist is called “apostasia kat’ exochän”; 4) the dominion of Antichrist is erected and supported by lying wonders, 2nd Thessalonians 2:9, 10; 5) Antichrist rages against those who profess the Gospel of Christ and subjects them to violent persecutions, Revelation 17:6; 6) Antichrist will remain until the return of Christ, 2nd Thessalonians 2:8, 9. There criteria, especially when they are viewed jointly, do not point to some secular ruler, or to the unbelievers and scoffers which have always existed in the world of fallen men, 2nd Peter 3:3, but they only tally with the Roman pope. The pope sits in the church; members of the church, especially the baptized infants, are found in his dominion; the pope has assumed as his official title the designation vicar, or vice-regent, of Christ; he has presumed to change the Gospel and the ordinances of Christ in a most arbitrary manner; yea, he has ascribed to himself infallibility. The pope assails the principal doctrines of the Christian faith: that Christians are subject not to a man, but to Christ alone; that Christians are saved by faith in Christ, not by works. These teachings the popes have anathematized. A greater apostasy from Christian faith than that which has occurred in the papacy, is not easy to imagine. Whenever an opportunity has offered itself, the pope has confirmed his rule over men by lying signs and wonders, and whenever he was permitted, he has persecuted the saints of God in a most savage fashion. Since even in the Lutheran Church in America, there is a great deal of ignorance as to what the Lutheran Church actually believes and teaches regarding Antichrist, I shall cite our confessions. The Smalcald Articles states: “It is, however, manifest that the Roman pontiffs, with their adherents, defend godless doctrines and godless services. And the marks of
Antichrist plainly agree with the kingdom of the Pope and his adherents. For Paul (2 Ep. 2:3), in describing to the Thessalonians Antichrist, calls him an adversary of Christ, ‘who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped, so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God’. He speaks therefore of one ruling in the Church, not of heathen kings, and he calls this one the adversary of Christ, because he will devise doctrine conflicting with the Gospel, and will assume to himself divine authority. Moreover, it is manifest, in the first place, that the Pope rules in the Church, and by the pretext of ecclesiastical authority and of the ministry has established for himself this kingdom. For he assigns as a pretext these words: ‘I will give to thee the keys’. Secondly, the doctrine of the Pope conflicts in many ways (in all ways) with the Gospel, and the Pope assumes to himself divine authority in a threefold manner: First, because he takes to himself the right to change the doctrine of Christ and services instituted by God, and wishes his own doctrine and his own services to be observed as divine. Secondly, because he takes to himself the power not only of binding and loosing in this life, but also the right concerning souls after this life. Thirdly, because the Pope does not wish to be judged by the Church or by any one, and prefers his own authority to the decision of Councils and the entire Church. But to be unwilling to be judged by the Church or by any one is to make one’s self God. Lastly, these errors so horrible, and this impiety, he defends with the greatest cruelty, and puts to death those dissenting. This being the case, all Christians ought to beware of becoming partakers of the godless doctrine, blasphemies and unjust cruelties of the Pope. On this account they ought to desert and execrate the Pope with his adherents, as the kingdom of Antichrist; just as Christ has commanded (Matthew 7:15): ‘Beware of false prophets’. And Paul commands that godless teachers should be avoided and execrated as cursed (Galatians 1:8; Titus 3:10). And (2nd Corinthians 6:14) says: ‘Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers; for what communion hath light with darkness’?” Tractatus de potestate papae, §39-41, Jacobs, page 345f. Again: “The Pope raised his head above all. This article clearly shows that the Pope is the very Antichrist [Dau: ipsum verum antichristum], who has exalted and opposed himself against Christ, because he does not wish Christians to be saved without his power, which nevertheless is nothing, and is neither established nor commanded by God. This is, properly speaking, to ‘exalt himself above all that is called God’, as Paul says, 2nd Thessalonians 2:4. This indeed neither the Turks nor the Tartars do, although they are great enemies of Christians, but they allow whoever wishes to believe in Christ, and they receive (outward or) bodily tribute and obedience from Christians. The Pope, however, prohibits this faith, saying that if any one wish to be saved he must obey. This we are unwilling to do, even though on this account we must die in God’s name. This all proceeds from the fact that the Pope has wished to be considered the supreme head of the Christian Church according to divine law. Accordingly he has made himself equal to and above Christ, and has caused himself to be proclaimed the head, and then the lord of the Church, and finally of the whole world, and simply God on earth, until he has attempted to issue commands even to the angels in heaven. And when a distinction is made between a dogma of the Pope and Holy Scripture, and a comparison of the two is made, it is found that the dogma of the Pope, even the best, has been taken from (civil) imperial and heathen law, and treats of political matters
and decisions or rights, as the Decretals show; afterwards, it teaches of ceremonies concerning churches, garments, food, persons and like shows, masks and comical things above measure, but in all these things nothing at all of Christ, faith and the commandments of God; and lastly is nothing else than the devil himself, while over and against God he urges (and disseminates) his falsehoods concerning masses, purgatory, a monastic life, one’s own works and (fictitious) divine worship (for this is the true Papacy, upon each of which the Papacy is altogether founded and is standing), and condemns, murders and tortures all Christians who do not exalt and honor these abominations of the Pope above all things. Wherefore just as we cannot adore the devil himself as Lord and God, so we cannot endure his apostle, the Pope or Antichrist, in his rule as head or lord. For to lie and to kill, and to destroy body and soul eternally, is a prerogative of the Papal government,” Smalcald Articles, Part II, Article IV, §9-14, Jacobs, page 320.
This strong indictment of popery is contained in a comprehensive form and in Melanchthon’s diction in the Apology, Chapter IV, Articles VII and VIII, §23, 24, Jacobs, page 166. No single individual either before or after his time has so thoroughly understood and so completely unmasked the papacy as Luther, who, according to all the evidence in the case, was undoubtedly the chosen instrument of God for the spiritual overthrow of Antichrist, and the angel whom John in the Apocalypse saw flying through the midst of heaven, with the everlasting Gospel [Revelation 14:6]. Luther’s anti-papal writings are world-classics of enduring value. Every theologian should make himself conversant with them. To cite a few statements to show the quality of Luther’s insight into “the mystery of iniquity,” Luther says in his exposition of First John: “Der Papst bekennt zwar dieses Wort: Christus ist ins Fleisch kommen, aber er leugnet dessen Frucht. Das ist aber ebensoviel, als wenn man sagt: Christus ist nicht ins Fleisch kommen. Denn die Zukunft Christi ins Fleisch ist nicht deswegen geschehen, dass er um sein selbst willen ein Mensch wurde, sondern, auf dass er uns selig machte. Wer da lehret, dass er also kommen sei, der hebt die Frucht und Kraft seiner Zukunft auf. Denn Christus ist kommen zu dem Ende, dass er die Werke des Teufels zerstoerete, dass er die Suender von Suenden erloste. Dieses aber leugnet der Papst. Er behaelt zwar eben diese Worte, im uebrigen aber leugnet er die Kraft seiner Zukunft, das ist, dass unser Herz auf die Gerechtigkeit Christi allein sein Vertrauen setzen und dadurch gerecht werden soll. Der Papst verdammt diesen Artikel in seinen Bullen, dass wir durch die Gerechtigkeit Christi allein gerecht wurden, welches doch die Wirkung seiner Menschwerdung ist. Aber Paulus widerspricht diesem mit klaren Worten: ‘So halten wir es nun dafuer, dass der Mensch gerecht werde ohne des Gesetzes Werke, allein durch den Glauben’, Romans 3:28. Und unser Johannes: ‘Sein Blut macht uns rein von allen Suenden’, 1st John 1:7. Daher verdammt Petrus die jenigen, die den Herrn der sie erkauft hat, verleugnen, 2nd Peter 2:1. Sie bekennen zwar den Herrn; dass er sie aber erkauft habe, das leugnen sie. Demnach machen wir aus diesem Text den Schluss, dass des Papstes Geist vom Teufel sei, indem er die Kraft und Wirkung der Zukunft Christi leugnet…. Der Papst nimmt den Kern Christi weg und laesst nur leere Worte uebrig. Er laesst ihm die Schale und nimmt den Kern heraus. Denn er bekennet zwar Christi Gerechtigkeit, doch also, dass unsere Gerechtigkeit nicht aufgehoben werde. Und das ist ebensoviel, als nichts bekennen…. Niemand hat die Eigenschaften des Antichrists so
listig, so verschlagen, erfuellet als der Papst. Manichaeus zwar, Marcion, Valentinus kamen auch grob, wenn sie sagten, das Fleisch Christi war nur ein Blendwerk gewesen, und haette nur so geschienen, als ob es Fleisch waere; und die Schwaermer sagen: Christi Fleisch sei kein nuetze. Aber des Papstes sein Geist ist der aller subtilste, als der zwar die Zukunft Christi erkennet, die apostolischen Worte (und apostolischen Werke) und apostolischen Predigten behaelt, aber den Kern hat er herausgenommen, welcher darin bestehet: er sei kommen dass er die Suender selig mache. Daher hat er die Welt mit Sekten erfuellet. Er hat zum Schein alles gelassen, aber in der Tat und Wahrheit alles genommen. Das erfordert Kunst und Betrug, unter dem besten Schein alles zu beflecken und zu sagen, dass Christus fuer uns gelitten habe, und doch zugleich lehren, dass wie gering tun. Alle uebrigen Ketzer sind nur in gewissen Stuecken Widerchristen, dieser ist aber der einzige und wahre Widerchrist, der wider den ganzen Christum ist,” IX, 1472ff. In his treatise “On the Abuse of the Mass,” Luther wrote in 1522: “Darum sollst du auch wissen, dass der Papst der rechte, wahrhaftige, letzte Antichrist ist, davon die ganze Schrift sagt, welchen der Herr Christus jetzund mit dem Geist seines Mundes zu toeten hat angefangen, und wird ihn gar bald mit der Erleuchtung seiner Zukunft, der wir warten, zerstoeren und erwuergen,” Erlangen, 28, 129. And in his last polemical writing against Rome: “Das Papsttum zu Rom vom Teufel gestiftet,” Luther says: “Wiewohl des Papsttums teuflischer Greuel an sich selbst ein unendlicher, unaussprechlicher Wust ist, so hab’ ich doch, hoffe ich, wer ihm will sagen lassen (fuer mich selbst bin ich gewiss) das erste Stueck, so ich droben vorgenommen; obs wahr, dass der Papst ueber die Christenheit das Haupt, ueber Kaiser, Koenige, aller Welt Herr sei, so klaerlich und gewaltiglich aus gefuehret, dass, Gott Lob! Kein gut christlich Gewissen anders glauben kann, denn dass der Papst nicht sei, noch sein kann das Haupt der christlichen Kirche, noch Statthalter Gottes oder Christi; sondern sei das Haupt der verfluchten Kirche aller aergsten Buben auf Erden, ein Statthalter des Teufels, ein Feind Gottes, ein Widersacher Christi und Zerstoerer der Kirche Christi, ein Lehrer aller Luegen, Gotteslaesterung und Abgoetterei; ein Erzkirchendieb und Kirchenraeuber der Schluessel, aller Gueter, beide der Kirche und der weltlichen Herren; ein Moerder der Koenige und Hetzer zu allerelei Blutvergiessen; ein Hurenwirt ueber alle Hurenwirte und aller Unzucht, auch die nicht zu nennen ist, ein Widerchrist, ein Mensch der Suenden und Kind des Verderbens, ein rechter Baerwolf. Wer dass nicht will glauben, der fahre immer hin mit seinem Gott, dem Papst. Ich als ein berufener Lehrer und Prediger in der Kirche Christi, und die Wahrheit zu sagen schuldig bin, habe hiermit das meine getan. Wer stinken will, der stinke; wer verloren sein will, der sei verloren; sein Blut sei auf seinem Kopf,” XVII, 1114f.
The Papists raise the objection against the Protestant argument that their papacy cannot be the Antichrist predicted in 2nd Thessalonians 2, because in that passage a single person, or individual, eine Einzelperson, not a succession of persons, or a system, is indicated. Our Lutheran dogmaticians have thoroughly exploded this objection. Scherzer writes: “Though for the time being the Antichrist exists sub imitate individuali, in a single individual, still we deny that he is absolutely a single person, for these reasons: because the extensive duration of Antichrist as indicated 2nd Thessalonians 2:6-8 exceeds the life time of a human being. For the apostle speaks of a preparation for and a secret working of the mystery of iniquity, which had
begun even in his time, 2nd Thessalonians 2:7; furthermore, of a hindrance to its full development, viz., while the secular power of the pagan Roman empire lasted; then, of the removal of this hindrance by the transfer of the imperial power to the Christians. He also names the terminus a quo, the starting point or beginning, of the revelation of Antichrist, which is to occur soon after the departure of the apostles, and the terminus ad quem, the slaying of Antichrist on the glorious day of the advent of Christ. He speaks of the working of so many lying signs and wonders which shall lead so many people of the truth to neglect this treasure and perish eternally. All this could not be accomplished within the space of three and a half years.”
The three years and a half to which Scherzer refers are those mentioned in Daniel 7 and 12 and Revelation 12. Basing on the time limit expressed in these texts, Bellarmine had propounded the following syllogism: Antichrist shall not reign more than three and a half years. The pope, however, has already ruled (spiritually) more than 1500 years, nor can anyone be named who has been regarded as Antichrist, that reigned precisely three and a half years. Hence the pope is not the Antichrist; yea, the Antichrist is not yet come. Gerhard meets this argument as follows: 1) If the three and a half years are to be understood as common years, it would be possible by their aid to fix the date of the end of the world. But Catholics as well as we Lutherans deny that this can be done. 2) The Catholic commentator Lyranus himself declares his doubt whether the three and a half years in Daniel must not be understood as “anni angelici,” and the days in Daniel 12 not as natural but as metaphorical days. 3) In Revelation 13:5, where we hear the mention of 42 months, some of the Papists interpret the “beast” to mean the Roman Empire. But no ancient or modern Roman can be pointed out that lasted only 42 months. Hence the same kind of an argument which they advance against our doctrine, that they are Antichrist, defeats their own exegesis here; but they do not seem to be mindful of their inconsistency. 4) In Daniel 7:25 the same period is ascribed to the rule of the pagan and oriental antichrist, i.e., the Turk. For both the ecclesiastical and the pagan, the occidental and the oriental pope, have begun to exercise their oppression about the same time. Now it is conceded all around that the oppression of the oriental antichrist has lasted longer than three and a half natural years; hence the rule of the occidental Antichrist likewise. 5) In these time-statements contained in Scripture a certain definite time is indeed expressed, and a certain definite time is beyond doubt fixed for this matter in the inscrutable counsels of God, and He wants us to know this fact, in order that we may not despair under the tyranny of Antichrist, but He has not revealed to us His standard of time-measurement, in order to exercise our faith and patience. And this is the reason, too, why in various Scripture texts a varying time-limit is fixed for the same event: 1260 days in Revelation 11:2; 12:6; 1290 days in Daniel 12:11; 1335 days in Daniel 12:12. Gerhard has also exhibited the ridiculous character of some of the papistic arguments that the Antichrist must be “unicus persona singularis.” Bellarmine had cited John 5:43: “If another (alius, “allos”) shall come in his own name, him ye will receive,” and had argued that the Lord is here contrasting another person with Himself, and another’s kingdom with His own. The Jews refused to accept the true Christ, who certainly was an individual person, and would accept instead Antichrist, who, therefore, would also have had to been an individual. Gerhard answers this argument thus: In John 4:37 we read: “One
soweth, another reapeth”; in 1st Corinthians 12:8-10: “To one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit; to another faith by the same Spirit, to another the gifts of healing,” etc. In these passages the word “another” is used not for an individual but for a class. And when Christ in Matthew 24:24 speaks of false Christs and false prophets coming at the end of time, He shows that Bellarmine’s interpretation of “allos” in John 4:37 is not tenable. Bellarmine had also pointed out that in the great text about the Antichrist in 2nd Thessalonians 2, the apostle speaks of “the man of sin,” verse 3, “that wicked,” verse 8, which expressions he considers as pointing to an individual. Gerhard replies that “the man of God” in 2nd Timothy 3:17 and other passages “anthroopos” even with the article stands for a plurality of persons. Besides he turns the tables on the papistical exegesis completely by citing Matthew 16:18 against them. The expression “epi tautä tä petra,” which was spoken to Peter, the Papists refer to their whole line of popes. Lastly, he reminds them that in their own church-canons, wherever the term “pope” occurs, the reference is not to a certain individual but to any scoundrel who may bear that name at the time. Philippi is right, when he says: “Es gibt keine exegetisch unbegruendetere und willkuerlichere Behauptung als die, 2nd Thessalonians 2:3, 4 koenne nur auf eine konkrete individuelle Einzelperson bezogen werden,” Glaubensartikel, IV.
All our theologians have seen the Scriptural criteria of the Antichrist predicted in Scripture realized only in the Roman pope:
1) His sitting in the temple of God, not in some obscure nook or corner of the church, but as the Greek fathers correctly interpret 2nd Thessalonians 2:4: “within the churches.” Scherzer holds that this mark of Antichrist tallies with no gentile emperor, whom some have supposed to be Antichrist. Grauer says: “Right in the kingdom of Antichrist the true church of God has remained; for otherwise Paul could not have said that Antichrist sits in the temple of God.” Luther wrote in 1528: “Wir bekennen aber, dass unter dem Papsttum viel christliches Gutes, ja, alles christlich Gut sei, und auch daselbst kommen sei an uns, naemlich, wir bekennen, dass im Papsttum die rechte Heilige Schrift sei, rechte Taufe, recht Sakrament des Altars, rechte Schluessel zur Vergebung der Suenden, recht Predigtamt, rechter Katechismus als Zehn Gebot, die Artikel des Glaubens, der Vater Unser; gleichwie er auch wiederum bekennt, dass bei uns (wiewohl er uns verdammt als Ketzer) und bei allen Ketzern sei die Heilige Schrift, Taufe, Schluessel, Katechismus u.s.w. O, wie heuchelst du hie? Wie heuchle ich denn? Ich sage, was der Papst mit uns gemein hat. So heuchelt er uns und den Ketzern wiederum, ja so sehr, und saget was wir mit ihm gemein haben. Ich will wohl mehr heucheln und soll mich dennoch nichts helfen. Ich sage, dass unter dem Papst die rechte Christenheit ist, ja, der rechte Ausbund der Christenheit und viel frommer grosser Heiligen. Soll ich aufhoeren zu heucheln? Hoere du selber was St. Paulus sagt 2nd Thessalonians 2:4: ‘Der Endchrist wird im Tempel Gottes sitzen’. Ist nun der Papst (wie ich nicht anders glaube) der rechte Endchrist, so soll er nicht sitzen oder regieren in des Teufels Stalle, sondern in Gottes Tempel. Nein, er wird nicht sitzen, da eitel Teufel und Unglaeubige oder da kein Christus oder Christenheit ist, denn er soll ein Widerchrist sein, darum muss er unter den Christen sein; und weil er daselbst sitzen oder regieren soll, so muss er Christen unter sich haben. Es heisst ja Gottes Tempel, nicht Steinhaufe, sondern die heilige
Christenheit, 1st Corinthians 3:17, darin er regieren soll. Ist denn nun unter dem Papst die Christenheit, so muss sie wahrlich Christi Leib und Glied sein. Ist sie sein Leib, so hat sie rechten Geist, Evangelium, Glauben, Taufe, Sakrament, Schluessel, Predigtamt, Gebet, Heilige Schrift und alles, was die Christenheit haben soll. Sind wir doch auch noch alle unter dem Papsttum und haben solche Christengueter davon. Denn er verfolgt uns, verachtet uns, verbannt uns, verjagt uns, verbrennt uns, erwuerget uns und gehet mit uns armen Christen um, wie ein rechter Endchrist mit der Christenheit umgehen soll. Nun muessen fuerwahr solche Christen recht getauft und rechtschaffene Glieder Christi sein, sie koennten sonst solchen Sieg wider den Endchrist durch den Tod nicht erhalten. Wir schwaermen nicht also, wie die Rottengeister, dass wir alles verwerfen, was der Papst unter sich hat; denn so wuerden wir auch die Christenheit, den ‘Tempel Gottes’ verwerfen, mit allem, das sie von Christi hat. Sondern das fechten wir an, dass der Papst nicht bleiben lassen will bei solchen Guetern der Christenheit, die er von den Aposteln geerbt hat, sondern tut seinen Teufelszusatz dabei und darueber und braucht solcher Gueter nicht nur zur Besserung Gottes, sondern zur Zerstoerung, dass man seine Gebot und Ordnung hoeher haelt, denn Christi Ordnung. Wiewohl in socher Zerstoerung Christus dennoch seine Christenheit erhaelt, gleichwie er Lot zu Sodom erhielt, als auch St. Petrus davon verkuendigt, 2nd Ep. 2:6, 7, dass also beides bleibe: der Endchrist sitze im Tempel Gottes durch Teufels Wirkung, 2nd Thessalonians 2:4, 9, und doch gleichwohl: der Tempel sei und bleibe Gottes Tempel durch Christi Erhaltung” (“Brief an zwei Pfarherrn von der Wiedertaufe,” Walch, 17, 264ff.).
That the “sitting” of Antichrist in the temple of God signifies his governing as head of the Church is generally conceded. The Roman bishop has assumed the title of “universalis episcopus.” Gerhard cites Pope Gregory against the admissibility of anyone assuming this title. Gregory, himself a Papist to the core, wrote: “I say in good faith that whoever calls himself, or desires to be called “universalis sacerdos” is in his self-exaltation a fore-runner of Antichrist.” Since Boniface III (607) all popes have done this very thing. Boniface III was the second pope after Gregory I.
2) 2nd Thessalonians 2:4 states that Antichrist “opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God,” i.e., over all authorities that exist by divine right, such as kings, princes, magistrates, heads of families, pastors etc. It says also that Antichrist “as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God.” “The term ‘Antichrist’,” says Gerhard in repeating an argument of Bellarmine, “signifies an enemy and rival of Christ. However the Roman pontiff in all his deliverances declares himself the servant and subject of Christ in every respect. He does not make himself equal to God, nor does he call himself God.” Gerhard replies to this Roman claim as follows: “As person may not call himself God in so many words, but may conduct himself in such a manner that he takes the place of God. Thus in the Donatist controversy, as we hear from Optatus Miliritanus, Donatus of Carthage conducted himself with such temerity, that Optatus had to write of him, among other things, ‘His heart is so puffed up, that he does not seem to be a man, but God’.” And now Gerhard proceeds to recount the following facts: 1) the pope has suffered the name of God to be applied to him by Constantine, and not only the name, but also the authority and sovereignty of God; for in one
of the collections of papal pronouncements we hear the pope saying: “It is shown quite clearly that the pope can neither be bound nor loosed by a secular authority; for it is a fact that the pope was called God by the pious emperor Constantine. It is manifest that God cannot be judged by men.” 2) The pope suffers the name of Christ to be applied to him. In his charge against the Waldensians the papal spokesman Claudius Seisselius said in 1520: “In whatever guilty transactions the pope may be implicated, he is an angel of God, yea, more, he is the successor of the apostles and the vicar of Christ; aye, I should rather say, He is Christ.” In a letter of Leonardi Nogarali to Sixtus IV, the latter is called “the beloved Son of Mary.” 3) The pope ascribes to himself and suffers to be ascribed to himself those things which properly belong to God alone. In the dedication of a volume printed at Nononia in 1608 (Benedict’s book about the Benedictions) the pope is thus addressed: “Vice-god, invincible monarch of the Christian republic and most energetic conservator of pontifical omnipotence.” Panonnitanus cites the following statement: “The pope and Christ form one consistory in such a manner that, excepting sin, the pope, as it were, can do all things that Christ does.” In a liturgical writing the following statement is found: “In the night of our Lord’s nativity the pope blesses a sword, which he afterwards gives to some ruler in token of the highest authority bestowed on the pontiff, according to that saying: ‘Unto me is given all power’.” In one of the encyclicals the power is ascribed to the pope that he can confer authoritative value on the word of God; for it is there declared that the Old and New Testaments must be received, not because they are in their entirety found in a canonical codex, but because the holy Pope Innocentius seems to have handed down a decision to this effect. The papists deny that Daniel 11:36 and 2nd Thessalonians 2:4 can be applied to the pope, because they claim that the pope has never exalted himself above everything that is God or is worshipped as God. Gerhard shows: 1) that the term “God” in these two texts must be understood in the widest sense, denoting anything that possesses authority divinely ordained, like that of parents and civil magistrates; 2) that the popes have wrested to themselves powers, privileges, dignities, which belong only to God. In one encyclical (“Haec quippe”) the pope claims that he can change righteousness to unrighteousness and vice versa. Pope Johannes Sylva [stated] that though the divine Law demanded that every matter must be established by two or three witnesses, he could decree otherwise. Pope Azorius claimed the authority to absolve himself from an oath that he had sworn. The Jesuit Tanner claims that the pope can abrogate the natural law. Another pope has declared himself to be the bridegroom of the church. That Constantine the Great worshipped the pope as God and successor to Christ, that he conferred divine honors on him and regarded him as the living image of Christ, is well known.
Protestant commentators have always considered the remark in Revelation 17:3, about the great whore sitting upon the beast having seven heads, which heads, according to verse 9, stand for seven hills, as referring to the seven-hilled Rome. And the remark of Paul in 2nd Thessalonians 2:6, 7 about the “katechon,” i.e., the obstacle which still is in the way, preventing Antichrist from unfolding himself fully, has always been interpreted to mean the Roman emperors. After the overthrow of the Roman empire the papacy became a power in Rome.
Also the great defection from the truth, mentioned in 2nd Thessalonians 2:3-11, and that men began to believe lies is regarded as fulfilled in the Roman papacy, because in 1st John 4:3 the spirit of Antichrist is called a “spirit of error.” Luther writes: “So hat nun der Herr Christus die Schluessel seiner Kirche und nicht dem Papst gegeben, dass er Gesetze und Suende nach seinem Wohlgefallen machete und der Schluessel Gewalt misbrauchete. Denn drum hat er auch zween Schluessel in seinem Wappen gefuehret, dass er als ein Raeuber und Boesewicht der ganzen Welt einen Schrecken und Furcht einjagete, und damit ist er auch der Antichrist worden, und daher macht ihn auch St. Paulus zum ‘Menschen der Suende’, nicht zwar fuer seine Person, sondern dass er ein Ursacher und Stifter ist aller Suenden in der Welt, und machet dass die Leute darueber verdammt werden. Denn wenn die Leute ihn hoeren und ihm folgen, so tun sie Suende, da doch keine Suende ist. Drum wird er auch das ‘Kind des Verderbens’ genannt,” Erlangen, XLIV, 102.
In 2nd Thessalonians 2:9, 10 the coming of Antichrist is said to be “after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, and with all deceivableness in unrighteousness,” and the same is stated in Revelation 13:13, 14. Quenstedt, referring to this criterion of Antichrist, points out that the opposition to Christ and the heavenly truth which is predicated of Antichrist is declared a “mystärion” in 2nd Thessalonians 2:7, because Antichrist never comes out in the open like scoffers and infidels in his opposition to Christ, but can be discovered as an enemy of Christ only by the tendency and effects of his operations against Christ. The mark of the beast in the forehead and on the hands mentioned in Revelation, Luther refers to the obedience to their laws, which the popes exact of men.
Another mark of Antichrist is discovered in Revelation 17:6 and 13, 15-17 when the beast is said to be drunk with the blood of the saints and martyrs of Christ, and to have made his rule among men, by causing all to be slain who would not worship the beast, and to have monopolized the trading of the world, by permitting only such to buy and sell who have the mark of the beast or the number of his name.
The papists declare the question concerning Antichrist a purely historical one and hence hold that it cannot be known with the certitude of faith that the pope is the Antichrist. If this were so, the warnings contained in Scripture to beware of Antichrist would all be in vain, to suppose or say which would be blasphemous. Spener writes: “Wie erweisen wir aber, dass der Papst gedachtermassen der grosse Antichrist sei? Antwort: Auf gleiche Art wie wir zu erweisen pflegen, dass Jesus von Narzareth der rechte Christus oder Messias sei, naemlich, Jesus ist Christus oder der Messias, weil alles das jenige ihm zukommt, und ausser ihm keinem anderen, was von dem Messias voerdem in den Propheten geweissagt worden war. Also auch muss der Papst der Antichrist sein, weil sich alles auf ihn schickt und hingegen nicht gezeigt werden kann, dass es einigem andern zukomme, was die Schrift von dem Antichrist sagt…. Diese Wahrheit und Materie, wie der roemische Papst der Antichrist sei, haben wir fleissig zu merken, und uns die Zeit, die wir jetzt zugehoert haben, nicht reuen zu lassen. Es ist dieser Artikell einer, zu dem sich unsere Kirche in den schmalkaldischen Artikeln ausdruecklich bekannt hat, und wir ja auch dieser Wahrheit nicht fahren lassen duerfen, und je naeher wir sorglich dabei sind, dass das roemische Babel
moechte seinen letzten Grimm und Verfolgung ueber uns ausgiessen, so viel mehr beduerfen wir in dieser Erkenntniss voellig gegruendet und gestaerkt zu werden, damit wir uns davor zu hueten lernen; wie denn ich dieses fuer ein Gewisses halte, wer das paepstliche Reich nicht fuer das antichristlische Reich erkennt, der steht noch nicht so feste, dass er nicht durch diese oder jene Verleitung moechte dazu verfuehret werden; wer aber in seinem Herzen sich dessen Ueberzeugt findet, der wird vor dem Abfall ziemlich sicher sein.” Again: “Dem Papsttum zu Gefallen koennen wir keinen Artikel unsers Glaubens fahren lassen, als welches hiesse, an der Wahrheit selbst, welcher an einander haenget, treulos werden. Also koennen wir dieses Stueck unserer Lehre nicht hingeben oder verlassen, dass der Papst der Antichrist sei, in dessen Erkenntniss (nachdem schon laengst vorhin ihm beriets auch andere dafuer erklaert) die Reformation uns gestaerket hat und wir mit Recht nicht zuruecktreten duerfen.” Again: “Es ist ein Lehrpunkt, welcher nicht allein hin und wieder von unserm christilichen und eifrigen Theologie in ihren Privatschriften getrieben wird, sondern sich auch in den schmalkaldischen Artikeln (Teil II, Artikel IV, Seite 307), welche unter unsere symbolischen Buecher gehoeren, und ein Stueck unserer Kirchen gemeiner Bekenntnis sind, ausdruecklich befindet, dass naemlich der roemische Papst (damit zwar nicht sowohl seine Person in sich, als ohn ausgeschlossen seiner, die jenige Wuerde und Hoheit, deren er sich anmasst, da er das sichtbare Haupt der Kirche sein und alles in derselben von ihm dependieren soll, gemeint wird) sei der rechte eigentliche grosse Antichrist, davon 2nd Thessalonians 2:3-8 geweissagt werde. Dass also unsere gemeine Lehre davon diese ist, es sei der roemische Stuhl, und was und sofern es sich an demselben haenget, wohin sonderlich die roemische Clerisei als mit genossen jener Regierung gehoert, das jenige antichristliche Reich, welches dem Reiche Christi in der letzten Zeit am meisten entgegensteht, in welchem der roemische, jedesmal regierende Papst das Oberhaput ist, und mit seinen um sich habenden das Uebrige regiert:” (“Gerechter Eifer wider das antichristliche Papsttum,” Seiten 63, 282, 308). Dannhauer declares: “Either no Antichrist will come into the world, or he it is who rules at Rome, and in whom all characteristics of Antichrist are found.” Adam Osiander stated in his day: “Also the present pope is and is called Antichrist. The reason why he is this lies not in some personal depravity or wickedness, but in the nature of his office. Now no pontiff as such, however upright he has been personally, has failed to declare himself the ecumenical head of the church, or who has not exercised authority in secular and spiritual affairs, or has not approved the condemnatory canons of the Council of Trent, though he may, for political reasons, abstain for the time being from slaughter and tyranny.”
Nobody feels surprised at finding the papists fighting this teaching that the Roman pontiff is the Antichrist, and that some of their theologians have invented the fantastic idea that the Antichrist predicted in Scripture will come out of the tribe of Dan, will rule three and a half years, and forty-five days after his coming the last judgment will take place. But there have been Protestants who have denied this teaching: in the Lutheran Church of the 17th century Georg Calixt rejected this teaching. In commenting on 1st John 2:18 he declared that the first antichrist mentioned in this text is still to be expected, while Calixt was willing to include the Roman pope among the many antichrists mentioned in this text on this supposition, if
he should wrest to himself exclusively and by divine right the dignity of being the vicar of Christ on earth. In our days Luthardt has taught: “Mit dem grossen Abfall, angedeutet Luke 18:8, ausgesprochen 2nd Thessalonians 2:3, steht die Offenbarung des Antichrists im Zusammenhang, der auf Grund des Danielischen Antiochus Epiphanes, 2nd Thessalonians 2:3ff., als das Widerspiel Christi, die persoenliche Concentration der Suende, der Gott dieser Welt, geschildert wird (vergleiche Luth. Lehre von den letzten Dingen, S. 145-164) der Weltherrscher des Endes, jetzt noch zurueckgehalten von einer aufhaltenden Macht (2 Thess. 2:6, 7: wohl die sittlichen Ordnungen des Voelkerlebens)…. Die alte Kirche nahm einen persoenlichen Antichristen an…. Spaeter sah man den Antichristen im Muhammedanismus, die Opposition des Mittelalters im Papsttum, so auch der Protestantismus…. Dies bezeichnen freilich die Roemischen als eine magna impudentia, und hielten mit exegetischem Recht entgegen, dass der Antichrist nach der Schrift nur einer und ein voelliger Feind Christi sei, u.s.w. Das richtige Verstaendniss hat sich besonders seit Bengel wieder angebahnt,” Kompendium der Dogmatik, Seiten 293ff. Hofmann wrote: “So duerfte es kaum anders moeglich gewesen sein, als dass sie [i.e., die Christen Thessalonich’s, 2nd Thessalonians 2] glaubten, eben der [Antiochus], welcher in wahnsinniger Selbstueberdhebung ueber alles, was Gott und goettlich heisst, den Tempel des Gottes Israel’s zum Goetzentempel machte, werde am Ende der Tage wunderbarer Weise wiedererscheinen und sein demals gestoertes Werk der Vernichtung der Gottesgemeinde wiederaufnehmen; ein Gedanke, den man immerhin abentheuerlich nennen und als eine unglueckliche Nachwirkung des rationalistischen, oder vielmehr altchristlichen, Idee von Nero’s Wiederkehr verdaechtigen mag, wenn ihm nur der Worlaut der paulinischen Lehre und, wie wir sehen werden, der johanneischen Weissagung Zeugniss gibt,” Der Schriftbeweis. Ein theologischer Versuch, Band II (Beck, Nördlingen, 1855), Seite 618. The reason why modern Lutherans and others deny that the pope is the very Antichrist is because they do not know what the Gospel is, and hence, what Christ really is. Whoever does not understand these things will never discern the Antichrist predicted in Scripture.
All these statements concerning the signs of the last times are not intended as in any way fixing the date of Christ’s return, for in that case Mark 13:32; Matthew 24:36 would be invalidated. They emphasize the importance of the signs which are before us and urge us to believe that God will not introduce another economy after the economy of grace, which is now in force. His eternal counsels have ripened well nigh to the final harvest. “The last times are doubtless upon the world.”
The signs of the last times have been divided by Baier into signa communia, or such as do not occur in a single century or age, but recur often and are continuous, such as heresies, wars and similar public calamities, great carnal security of men, and signa propria, which are not manifested until shortly before the coming judgment and have not occurred in the earlier centuries, e.g., the revelation of Antichrist, singular eclipses of the celestial bodies, their dropping on the earth, and perhaps other signs. Others call the signa communia the signa remota, because, while they do not signify to men the time of the last judgment, still they should be regarded by Christians as warning signals which God purposely exhibits to them, to indicate to them that a solemn judgment is impending and must be expected by virtue of the justice of God and the
truthfulness of His promises. The signa propria are also called signa propinqua, because they occur in more or less close connection with the coming Christ, and some of them, like the sign of the Son of Man, actually coincide with His coming. Luther expresses his view of these signs thus: “Ich will hier nicht fechten, sondern den Christen befehlen, ob die Zeichen an der Sonne, Mond und Sternen geschehen sind. Das ist aber mein Glaube und gewisse Hoffnung, dass solcher Zeichen das mehrere Teil schon geschehen sind und nicht veil andere zu warten.”

§180. The Purpose of the Second Advent.

The purpose of Christ’s return is misinterpreted by those who hold that Christ will come in order to establish a visible reign on earth – before the day of judgment, extending through a thousand years. Such texts of Scripture which are commonly adduced from the Old Testament in favor of this teaching refer either to the time [of the] incarnation of the Son of God, or to the state of the Church in the New Testament era, or to the glory of the Church triumphant. These phases are pictured in the imagery common to the prophetic and poetic writings of the O. T. The argument based on N. T. texts, chiefly Revelation 20:4ff. is unreliable, because Scripture offers no rule by which to measure the length of these prophetic years nor to determine their starting point. Hence Gerhard concludes that Chiliasm is “agraphos,” unscriptural. However, the bulk of chiliastic notions involves also a contradiction of Scripture truths, and is “antigraphos,” anti-scriptural. These notions vary in degree. In their coarsest form (chiliasmus crassus) they represent the millennial kingdom of Christ as an earthly existence, filled with all manner of carnal delights. In a less offensive form (chiliasmus subtilis) they picture the millennial reign as a personal reign of Christ on earth among His resurrected believers. Perfect righteousness will hold sway, all opposition to the Gospel and the Church of Christ will have been overcome completely. In its finest form (chiliasmus subtilissimus) chiliasm is the expectation of a season of tranquility and peace to the Church prior to the end of the world, omitting a visible presence of Christ on earth, his personal rule among men and a twofold resurrection. In every form chiliasm invalidates or weakens clear Scripture passages. 1) The character of the kingdom of Christ is spiritual; flesh and blood in its corrupt state cannot inherit it, 1st Corinthians 15:20. However, the believers must wrestle with their own flesh as long as they live on earth, and their cessation from sin does not begin until they have put off this body of sin, i.e., after they have died in the faith of their Savior. Compare §177, Section 3. 2) The condition of the Church on earth is represented as full of trouble, John 16:33. Out of their earthly tribulations Christians will enter the rest of heaven. 3) Scripture connects the second coming of Christ with the general resurrection of all the dead, 1st Thessalonians 4:16, 17, and the final salvation of believers, Hebrews 9:28. There is no intervening phase corresponding to the millennial reign. Paul, accordingly, places his hope not on the joys of an earthly reign of Christ, but looks directly to the great day, when Christ shall return to take His believers with Him to heaven, 2nd Timothy 4:8; Philippians 3:20. This agrees with the description which Christ Himself has given of the last judgment, Matthew 25. Our Church has rejected chiliasm in every form as injurious to faith
and piety in Article 17 of the Augsburg Confession, and her theologians in the age of the Reformation have without exception opposed it and have taken pains to show in what absurd contradictions Chiliasts become involved. (See Hollaz, Examen theologicum acroamaticum, P. III, Stargard 1707, Seite 1256.) Chiliastic views entered the Lutheran Church first in the days of Spener and the Pietistic movement. In the mild form in which Spener advanced his views, they were not pronounced heretical, because no fundamental doctrine of Scripture was affected by them. Still they were pronounced erroneous. Spener’s follower Peterson, however, became an enthusiast outright in his chiliastic teachings. Every form of chiliasm becomes heretical so soon as it exhibits two marks: 1) when Christ is represented as reigning visibly on earth among his believers, and 2) that there is a partial resurrection of believers prior to the general resurrection.
The picture, which Scripture sketches for us of the general character of the last times as regards their religious and moral condition is utterly opposed to those views of a coming golden age, that is to come before the Second Advent of Christ. These views are all embraced under the designation of chiliasm.
By chiliasm (from “chilioi,” a thousand, scil. years) is understood the teaching that the believers will be set up in an earthly kingdom here in this world before judgment day, which kingdom is to endure for a thousand years. The Augsburg Confession reckons this opinion with the Jewish notions and rejects it. The Jews were thoroughgoing chiliasts, or millenarians, because they were forever dreaming about a worldly kingdom of their Messiah. Chiliasm exists in many forms and admits of gradations. Hardly any two chiliasts coincide in every detail of their teachings. [August] Pfeiffer collects every kind of chiliasm, as we have seen, into these three classes: 1) crassissimus, 2) crassus, 3) subtilis. Chiliasm in its coarsest form is found among such people as the followers of Cerinthus in the first century of the Church. These people not only believed that Christ would come to set up a secular rule with His believers, but they combine epicurean expectations with their belief. Sensuous pleasures of the grossest kind, a voluptuous life, were made the strongest characteristic of this belief. In the sixteenth century this chiliasmus crassissimus cropped out among the Anabaptists, especially the followers of Thomas Muentzer, who set up a real kingdom in Westphalia in Germany in the city of Munster, where he ruled with a select band. These people had established communism among themselves as regards their earthly possession; they even had wives in common and practiced polygamy, overthrew the existing forms of government, slew magistrates and led a life of debauchery. The chiliasmus crassus is characterized by this peculiar view that before the day of judgment Christ will descend from heaven and raise the tried and tested believers of His flock, especially the martyrs, with whom He will then reign for a thousand years. The crass chiliasts, accordingly, teach a twofold visible return of Christ, one for the establishment of the millenarian kingdom, the other for the last judgment. They also teach a twofold resurrection of the dead, one a particular one of the parties named, the other, a universal one of all men. This form of chiliastic teaching was in the patristic age championed by Papias (“smikros ton noun”), and many of the early church fathers were addicted to it (Ireneus, Nepos, Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Lactantius). In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, this chiliasm was revived by Johannes Petersen, and
Johannes Albrecht Bengel. In the nineteenth century and today it exists in Hofmann’s, Delitzsch’s, Kurz’s, Luthardt’s, Volk’s, Loehe’s teaching and in the Iowa Synod. The chiliasmus subtilis finds expression in optimistic views like those of Spener, who held that just before the coming of Christ there would be a period of peace and prosperity in the church here on earth. The adherents in this form of chiliasm do not believe in a twofold advent of Christ nor in a twofold resurrection. Pfeiffer says: “Den subtilen Chiliasmus nennen wir die Meinung derjenigen, welche zwar dafuer halten, dass Tausend Jahre in Apoc. 20 seien noch nicht erfuellet, sondern es stehe die daselbst versprochene Herrlichkeit noch zu gewarten, doch so, dass sie keine sichtbare Wiederkunft Christi, zum irdischem Reich, keine persoenliche Regierung, keine doppelte Auferstehung, sondern nur halcyonia und eine friedlichen Zustand der Kirche statuieren, dabei die eigntliche Art, ja auch die Zeit (wie lange es eigentlich damit waehren werde) Gott heimstellen, wie Launaeus, Rallius, Coccejus, Brennius und andere tun. Solchen Chiliasmus halten wir nun zwar fuer falsch und irrig, allein weil dadurch die Grundartikel des christlichen Glaubens nicht angetastet werden, so halten wir denselben, zumal wenn man problematice davon handelt, und seiner Meinung niemand aufbuerdet, fuer keine Ketzerei.” Modern theologians claim that chiliasm is a doctrine of the Bible. The old dogmaticians of our Church, e.g., Gerhard, have declared that the chiliastic teachers love to garb their millenarian dreams in beautiful Scripture language and imagery, still their teaching is not only “agraphos,” outside of Scripture, but also “antigraphos,” against Scripture. To establish their claims chiliasts usually cite first Revelation chapter 20. This passage, however, is utterly wrested from its plain meaning by the use which millenarians make of it. The text treats of the reigning of souls in heaven, but not, as Delitzsch says, of resurrected bodies on earth. Besides, Gerhard is within his right when he argues that Revelation is an “antilegomenon” among the books of the N. T. This does not mean that Gerhard rejects Revelation and desires others to reject it, but he holds in an important matter like this, which affects the faith of the whole church, arguments and proofs must be adduced from books of the Bible of unquestioned authenticity, because only such proofs can convince and satisfy all. Other texts of Scripture which are cited by chiliasts treat either of the first advent of Christ at the incarnation, His coming into the flesh, or about the general condition of the church in N. T. times, or of the glory of the church triumphant. For example: in Isaiah 2:2-9 the spiritual migration of the peoples to the church of the N. T., which is accomplished by faith in the Gospel is depicted. In Isaiah 11:6-9 the prophet describes the power of the Gospel, by whose power savage and wild men become softened through the knowledge of the Savior Jesus Christ, and begin to worship the Father. In Zechariah 9:9, 10 the advent of Christ in the flesh and the condition of the kingdom of grace, the spiritual kingdom which is set up among men, by the power of the Gospel is depicted. In Joel 3:23ff. we have a description of the abundance of spiritual blessings which the church enjoys set before us in imagery that has been borrowed from temporal affairs.
However, chiliasm is not only unscriptural, but also anti-scriptural. For 1) the chiliasts assume an earthly and visible kingdom of Christ. Now Christ describes the true condition of His kingdom with these words: “My kingdom is not of this world,” i.e., it is not of a secular character. Again, in Luke 17:20:
“The kingdom of God cometh not with observation,” “meta paratäräsioos,” i.e., so that men can see it, “neither shall they say, ‘Lo here’! or ‘Lo there’! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you.” 2) The chiliasts persuade themselves that there will be a peaceful condition of the church on this earth. Scripture predicts for all Christians on earth until the end of the world sorrows and afflictions, e.g., in Acts 14:22: “Ye must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God”; John 16:33: “In the world ye shall have tribulation.” Rest and refreshment Christians are told to expect in heaven, e.g., Luke 12:32: “Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father’s pleasure to give you the kingdom.” That the Kingdom here intended is the Kingdom of heaven is seen from the next verse. Compare Matthew 5:11, 12. 3) According to the teaching of chiliasts it is a thousand years from the beginning of the millennium to judgment day. But Christians are warned in the Scripture to expect the return of Christ to judgment at any moment, Matthew 24:42-50; Matthew 25:13. 4) Chiliasts expect the coming of Christ’s adversary, the great Antichrist as an event that still lies in the future. However, the great Antichrist, the Roman pope, has already made his appearance and has been revealed as such, 2nd Thessalonians 2:3ff. 5) Chiliasts hope for an external separation of the wicked from the godly, before the final judgment. However, Christ teaches, Matthew 13:30, that the tares, the wicked, shall grow along side of the wheat, the believers, until the harvest, the consummation of the world. 6) Chiliasts assert a twofold visible return of Christ after His advent into the flesh. The opposite is declared in Hebrews 9:28, where the advents of Christ are enumerated, as follows: “Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for his coming shall he appear the second time (“ek deuterou”) without sin unto salvation” (“eis sooterian”), i.e., for their eternal salvation, not for the purpose of erecting a millenarian kingdom on earth. 7) Chiliasm asserts a twofold bodily resurrection, one a particular and limited one, the other a universal one, of all men. However, Scripture teaches only one resurrection of all the dead on the last day, when it says, John 5:28: “All (also the believers and martyrs) who are in the grave shall hear the voice of the Son of God and shall come forth.”
The evil effects of chiliastic teaching have become apparent, e.g., when Loehe stated that the church would receive the greatest blessing from the millenarian reign and also from the teaching concerning the same at present; he promised that new life would be infused into the church by chiliasm. However, the opposite is true: like every other doctrine that has been thought out by men outside of and contrary to the Scripture, so chiliasm has inflicted a very great harm on the church. For the chiliasts rivet their thought and the ardor of their devotion entirely on the millenarian reign of Christ on earth and fail to see the spiritual glory of that kingdom which Christ has already raised on earth among His true believers. Luther pointed out this serious damage when in his commentary to the prophet Micah he wrote: “Man muss hier bald im Anfange den christlichen Leser erinnern, dass er sich mit hoechstem Fleiss vorsehe vor den falschen Traeumen der Juden und Chiliasten, die solche geistliche Verheissung Gottes auf das leibliche und irdische Reich ziehen und fallen also in zweierlei groebliche Irrtuemer. Denn sie verlieren also und erkennen nicht den Herrn Jesum Christum, der ein geistlich Reich hat, und warten umsonst, dass Christus ein leiblich Reich auf Erden werde aufrichten,” XIV, 1056. On the passage often cited by chiliasts: “Other sheep I have, which are not of this
fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd,” John 10:16, Luther offers the following comment: “Es haben auch etliche diesen Spruch dahin gedeutet, dass es muesse erfuellet werden bald vor dem juengsten Tage, wenn der Endchrist werde kommen und Elias und Enoch. Das ist nicht wahr, und hats eigentlich der Teufel zugerichtet, dass man glaubt, die ganze Welt werde Christen werden. Der Teufel hats darum getan, dass er die rechtschaffene Lehre verdunkele, dass man sie nimmer recht verstuende. Darum heute dich dafuer, dieser Spruch ist wahr worden und erfuellet bald darnach, da Christus zum Himmel ist gefahren, und geht noch immer im Schwange. Da das Evangelium anging, ward es den Juden gepredigt; das Volk war der Schafstall. So saget er nun hier: “Ich habe noch andere Schafe, die sind nicht aus diesem Schafstalle’, die muss ich such herzubringen. Da sagt er, dass den Heiden auch soll das Evangelium gepredigt werden, dass sie auch an Christum glauben, dass also aus Juden und Heiden eine christliche Gemeinde werde; das hat er darnach durch die Apostel getan, die den Heiden predigten und bekehrten sie zu dem Glauben. Also ist nun alles eine Kirche oder Gemeinschaft, ein Glaube, eine Hoffnung, eine Liebe, eine Taufe und dergleichen. Dass waehret noch heut zu Tage immerdar, bis auf den juengsten Tag. Darum muesst ihr es nicht also verstehen, dass die ganze Welt und alle Menschen an Christum werden glauben; denn wir muessen immer das heilige Kreuz haben, dass ihr das mehrere Teil sind, die die Christen verfolgen; so muss man auch immer das Evangelium predigen, dass man immer etliche herzubringe, dass sie Christen werden; denn das Reich Christi stehet im werden, nicht Geschehen,” XI, 791f.
Chiliasts turn the hearts of men away from the Gospel and the forgiveness of sin there offered, and thus from Christ and His true Kingdom, and produce a carnal curiosity in their followers. Forgetting the statement of Paul that our conversation (“citizenship”) is in heaven, they pervert the character of Christian hope, which is fixed on the future glory, and fix it upon a fictitious happiness which the church according to their teaching is to enjoy here on earth. They feed the carnal security of men, for led astray by chiliastic dreams men make nothing or very little of the last judgment. Accordingly, Hollaz is right when he says: “We prove this assertion that chiliasm is unscriptural 1) because we know from the inspired Word that there is but a threefold Kingdom of Christ. Now the kingdom of which millenarians speak is neither the kingdom of power, of grace, nor of glory. Hence it is not a true kingdom of Christ at all, but an ens rationale et somnium hominum vigilantium. 2) In the millenarian kingdom there cannot be a greater illumination by the Holy Spirit, than there was in the Kingdom of grace at the times of the apostles. (However, these possessed only an imperfect holiness and) That knowledge of God was imperfect. Ergo…. 3) The citizens of the millenarian kingdom cannot excel by reason of more perfect holiness than the apostles. However these possessed only an imperfect holiness, and all of them bewailed the fact. Hence until judgment day there will not be found on this earth any men who are perfect saints.” And after offering eight additional arguments against chiliasm, most of which have already been noted, Hollaz concludes by saying: “This hypothesis about the millenarian kingdom of Christ does not kindle devotion but extinguishes it, or at least checks its flame. For by it men are turned away from a desire of the heavenly and spiritual
blessings, which is the proper Christian desire. The chiliastic notions feed the carnal security of men, because they make men feel justified in putting the day of judgment a long way off from them, and teach them to live supinely (in den Tag hinein). These notions also make men eager to introduce all sorts of new fangled schemes and to disturb the existing order of things, to overthrow governments, incite revolutions as happened in the Peasants’ War.”
With the chiliastic teachings must be grouped the claim that there will be a general conversion of the Jews to Christianity before the judgment day. The Scripture passage cited to substantiate this claim is Romans 9:25ff.; 11:25, 26, where the apostle says: “Pas Israäl soothäsetai,” “all Israel shall be saved.” Chiliasts understand the term “Israel” in this text as meaning the Jewish nation. The correct way to meet this error is to hold the claimants to the clear wording of the text. The text says: “all” Israel shall be saved. This does not mean a considerable number, or the great majority, or nearly the entire number of Israelites, but each and every Jew shall be saved. Moreover, if Israel in this refers to the Jewish nation, the apostle’s statement must be made to apply not only to Jews who were living at that time, or who might live before Christ returns, but also any Jew that had lived in past ages. This text, then, would teach absolute universalism, so far as the Jews are concerned. It would be impossible for any Jew to be lost, if “Israäl” means the Jews. The defenders of the idea of a universal or general conversion of the Jews have felt that this understanding of the text, which, however, is the only correct one if Israel here means the Jews, is more than they are willing to sponsor. Hence they have interpreted “pas” to mean “bene multi,” Baier: ziemlich viel. But it is easy to defeat this interpretation. “Pas” simply does not mean “quite a number,” but “all.” If people who cite this text for their chiliastic view will not stick to the text, they sacrifice their right to cite the text at all for their view. But what does the text say in reality, when properly understood? Israel, in the apostle’s parlance, especially in Romans, is often the spiritual Israel, the sum-total of the believers in Christ, or of the elect, so far as these come from among the Jews, whom the apostle has also called “ta tekna täs eppangelias,” Romans 9:8. The counterpart of “pas Israäl” thus understood is “to plärooma toon ethnoon, which does not mean the absolute numerical totality of all gentiles, but the sum total of the elect from the gentiles. In this sense “pas Israäl soothäsetai” is a perfectly correct statement. Every believing Jew certainly will be saved. The apostle also shows in verse 25, how this is to be done. “Blindness,” he says, “is happened to Israel in part,” that is, there are always some Jews who come to see the truth as it is in Jesus. While the fulness of gentiles is entering the broad Gospel portals of the N. T. it happens, especially through the Christian missions to the Jews, that some Jews here and there have their eyes opened. “And thus,” “kai houtoo,” says the apostle, “all Israel shall be saved,” i.e., by the gentiles and the Jews being converted, God attains His elective purpose of saving “all Israel,” viz., the entire Israel of the Spirit, all true believers. The deleterious effects of chiliasm are seen also at this point. For the advocates of the idea of a general conversion of the Jews before judgment day do not accelerate but impede the conversion of the Jews that ought to be going on now. They turn the eyes of the Jews and of many Christians, who should help the Jews, away from the Gospel which saves, and cause them to dream about some mysterious event in the future, when the wholesale conversion
of the Jews will occur like a deus ex machina, with a wonderful eclat. Luther says about this notion: “Vom ganzen Haufen mag hoffen, wer da will, ich habe da keine Hoffnung, weiss auch davon keine Schrift. Koennen wir doch unsere Christen, den grossen Haufen nicht bekehren, muessen uns am kleinen Haeuflein genuegen lassen: wie viel weniger ists moeglich, diese Teufelskinder alle zu bekehren. Denn dass etliche aus der Epistel zun Roemern am 11 Kapitel solchen Wahn schoepfen, als sollten alle Juden bekehrt werden am Ende der Welt, ist nichts; St. Paulus meinet gar viel ein anderes,” W, XX, 2529f. Again: “Nach dieser Weise soll man auch das Wort Israel in diesen zwei Kapiteln (Hez. 38, 39) vornehmen. Denn die Apostle und andere Juenger Christi, so aus den Juden kommen, waren rechte Israel, und haben auch des ganzen Volkes Israel namen getrieben, wie St. Paulus den Namen Ben-Jamin. Darum ist der Name Israel hinfort bei den Aposteln blieben, und auf alle ihre Juenger geerbet, dass nunmehr die heilige Christenheit, und wir auch, und alle, die dem Wort der Apostel glaeuben und ihre Juenger sind, Israel heissen…. Das sage ich darum, dass man sich an der Juden auslegung nicht kehre, es gehet sie dieser Text nichts an Daniel 9:26, 27 hat ihnen angezeigt ihr Ende, dass sie keinen Versammlung nicht hoffen duerfen. Wir sind’s, die uns allerlei Voelkern zusammenbracht unter seinen Herrn Christum,” W, VI, 1410.

§181. The Resurrection of the Dead.

The returning Christ will publish His presence on earth in a manner that must arrest the attention of all men living and startle the dead in their graves. He shall descend from heaven “en keleusmati,” with a shout, like that of a herald issuing an order to an assembly. The phrases following “en phoonä archangellou” and “en salpingi theou” amplify the first statement. Some archangel, perhaps Michael (Jude 9) with a clarion voice sounding like a powerful trumpet will issue a call in the name of the Lord to the inhabitants of the earth and those who sleep in their graves, 1st Thessalonians 4:16. This is what Christ, John 5:25, calls the voice of the Son of God, and what is called “the last trump,” 1st Corinthians 15:52. The very first effect of this summons will be the reawakening of the dead; the next effect will be the transformation of the living. This order is indicated both by the succession in which the events are named in 1st Corinthians 15:52, and still more distinctly by the particles “prooton” and “epeita,” in 1st Thessalonians 4:16, 17. The entire event, however, will take place very rapidly, “en rhipä ophthalmou,” in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye. The two terms which the apostle employs to express his meaning, indicate that he wishes to be understood literally. The entire event will not be a slow mechanical process of evolution through certain stages, but it will be a supernatural and instantaneous act, like the creative acts of God were at the beginning of the world. And it will be effected by the omnipotent Word of God, who speaks and it is done.
The raising of the dead is ascribed to Christ, because to Him has been committed the last judgment, and He has earned for all men, but especially for the believers, the resurrection unto life by His death and resurrection. It is Christ and He alone who will appear on the last day and before whom all nations shall be gathered, 1st Thessalonians 4:16; Matthew 25:31, 32. But the raising of the dead is ascribed also to the Father, John
5:21, and to the Spirit, Romans 8:11. In John 5:21 the quickening power of the Father is identified with that of the Son (confer John 6:40, 54), while Romans 8:11 unites the Father and the Spirit in this act. Hence the resurrection of the dead is an opus ad extra, in which every person of the Trinity participates and cooperates, because it is effected by that power which is essential and common to all three persons, and because it is the final act of that plan of redemption which was devised harmoniously in the eternal counsel of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost.
Hanekin says: “The resurrection does not take place by the powers of nature; hence those labor in vain who are looking among the dead and dry ashes of a man for sparks of life and seeds of life.”
Baier names as the causa inpulsiva interna of the resurrection “in genere iustitia divina et speciatim, respectu piorum iustitia remuneratoria, respectu impiorum iustitia vindictiva,” and the causa impulsiva externa as regards the godly “meritum Christi fide finali apprehensum” and as regards the wicked “impoenitentia finalis.” Our theologians have all warned against the Calvinistic notion that the merit of Christ also procured the resurrection of the wicked. The Lutheran theologian Henry Boethius also taught this untenable view.
Scripture is also explicit in stating that with the resurrection of the dead time will come to an end. This event will usher in “the last day,” John 6:40, 54.
Resurrection is the anticlimax of death. As the latter was general, so will the former be. The quickening power of God is unlimited; it extends to “whomsoever he will,” to “the dead,” i.e., to anyone who has died, John 5:21. And God has willed that the resurrection shall be universal. “All that are in the graves shall come forth,” John 5:28; “before him shall be gathered all nations,” Matthew 25:32; “we must all appear before Christ,” 2nd Corinthians 5:10. In order to preclude the idea that anyone will be excepted, Paul in the passage last-quoted exchanges the generalizing “all” for the particularizing “every one” in the last half of the verse; Christ and Paul furthermore affirm that the resurrection will extend “both to the just,” “those that have done good,” and “to the unjust,” “those that have done evil,” Acts 24:15; John 5:29. The resurrection is an event, which no one can escape. It is not restricted to the pious only, as the Jews have claimed. Nor can the view of the Socinians, that the ungodly will remain in death forever, or of Hofmann, that there will be an utter annihilation of the unjust. Hofmann says: “In der That [Tat] ist ja Vernichtung der Unterwelt und Aufhoeren der Herrschaft des Todes eins und dasselbe. Wir erhalten also den angemessenen Gedanken, dass sie Unfrommen mit dem Morgen nach der Todesnacht, wenn des Todes Herrschaft aufhoert, unter die Herrschaft der Gerechten und durch die Vernichtung der Unterwelt, welcher ihr Leibliches mitverfaellt [niederfaellt], um dessen letzte traurige Wohnung, somit aber um ihr Leibliches selbst kommen, welches nun nicht mehr seines Bleibens hat,” Schriftbeweiss, II, 469. The Jews (Rabbi Kimchi) restrict the resurrection to the godly; those buried in Canaan will rise without any difficulty; but those buried outside of Canaan must be brought with much pain and labor through subterranean passages to the land of Canaan, to be raised then. The Socinians deny the resurrection of the wicked.
The form of the resurrection consists 1) in a resurrection of the dead body; 2) in the reunion of the soul with the body which it inhabited before death. The former act is described by
the terms “egeirein,” to raise, John 5:21; Romans 8:11; 1st Corinthians 15:44; “dzoo-opoein,” to quicken, or make alive, to revive, John 5:21; Romans 8:11. The latter act is not expressed in so many words in Scripture, but it is necessarily implied, when the dead are represented as hearing the voice of Christ, standing before His judgment and having their records during life exposed. Since they are held responsible for their doings during that period of their existence, when body and soul were still united, they must be judged likewise according to body and soul. Moreover, the form of death (§175) was seen to be the disruption of that essential bond which joined soul and body in one essence. Accordingly, the sequel and counterpart of death, resurrection, must be the reconstruction of that union, which death had broken. The entire process of the resurrection is named in Scripture “anastasis,” John 5:29; Acts 24:15; “exanastasis,” Philippians 3:11; “palingenesia,” Matthew 19:28.
The reunion will coalesce the identical parts which were separated in the moment of death. The same bodies that were placed “in the graves,” John 5:28, “this corruptible,” “this mortal,” 1st Corinthians 15:53, will be raised. Individuality will be restored to each. Paul and Job join with the terms “body” and “flesh” possessive pronouns (“your,” “our,” “my”), which express personal ownership, Romans 8:11; Philippians 3:21; Job 19:26. Yea, the dead will be raised in the same stature, which they had when they died. Children and adults will be raised as such, Revelation 20:12. And the soul which is united with each body will be the identical soul which had inhabited that body. For the soul is primarily responsible for a person’s actions during life, which form the subject of the Judge’s inquiry, 2nd Corinthians 5:10; Revelation 20:12.
The former body of a person that is raised in the resurrection is called in dogmatical parlance the subiectum quo of the resurrection, or that essential part of man, according to which man is said to rise again, or which, having been formerly destroyed, is reproduced by the resurrection and reunited with the other part that survived, the soul. This body that is raised is idem numero, that is, the same specimen, not only the same kind of body as that which was buried. This fact is implied in the very terms “anastasis” and “exanastasis,” which describe the event as the resurrection; for these terms express that that body shall stand forth again which had succumbed to death. If another body were to come out of the grace than that which was put away, that would not be a resurrection of something that existed before, but a new creation of something that had not existed before.
Gerhard reviews the chief arguments of opponents to this Scriptural doctrine as follows: 1) They argue from the statement of our Savior, Matthew 22:30; Luke 20:36: “The children of the resurrection shall be equal to the angels,” “isangeloi,” that the resurrected will be made angels, “isangeloi.” But similarity is not identity, “homoiotäs kai isotäs” non est statim “tautotäs.” The blessed are like unto the angels not as regards the essence of their nature, but a certain agreement of their condition in glory with that which the angels have attained; hence the blessed are not called angels, but it is said that they will be like the angels. 2) From the statement in 1st Corinthians 15:50: “Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God,” it is argued that the resurrected and glorified bodies will not be bodies of flesh and blood. But the apostle has in this very chapter plainly asserted that the identical bodies will be raised that were planted in the earth. In that text
cited he does not speak of our bodies considered absolutely, per se, but of our bodies as they have existed amid the corruptions and contaminations of the present life. These vile bodies of sin indeed cannot enter heaven. Just as man born of the flesh is flesh and cannot see God without having been born again of the water and the Spirit, so his body cannot enter heaven until its corrupt qualities are put away. Hence flesh and blood are in this text ruled out of heaven “non substantiae sed culpae nomine.” The resurrection does not change the bodies “substantiae sed qualitatum ratione.” 3) From the comparison which the apostle institutes in 1st Corinthians 15:37-39 it is argued that not the same but another body shall come out of the grave in the resurrection. But this view goes beyond the tertium comparationis intended by the apostle. Just as the body of Christ was deposited in the tomb as a grain of wheat is sown into the ground, and came forth again changed not in essence, but in quality, so our bodies shall be the same as regards their new properties. In Th. Brown’s Religio Medici the thought is expressed that as a flowing river is always the same, though the water in it changes every second, so the raised bodies will be the same as those that were buried. Fecht rightly holds that this is an incorrect view: “non est carnis resurrectio eiusdem numero.” Nor can it be properly said that the resurrection-bodies suffer an accretion, as that would mean that they assume new matter and become physically altered in their composition and grow quantitatively.
Against this teaching Origenes and after him the Socinians held that the resurrection-bodies will be altogether new bodies, “corpora coelestia,” and the Arminians leave it in doubt whether the saints will receive the same bodies or whether God will create new bodies for them. In our day Kahnis has taught: “Die Auferstehung wird nicht die Neubelegung des begrabenen Fleisches sein, sondern die Umkleidung der Seelemit einem verklaerten Leibe,” Der innere Gang des deutschen Protestantismus, Band II (Aufl. Verlag Dörffling & Franke, Leipzig 1874), Seite 279. In his dogmatics Kahnis says: “Unserem Leibe sind die Elemente aus denen er besteht [auf Erden], durchaus nicht wesentlich. Der Stoff, aus dem unser Leib heute besteht, scheidet frueher oder spaeter wieder aus. Manche Bestandteile, wie Haare, Naegel, Zaehne u.s.w. verlieren wir auf Erden ohne dass das Verlorene die Integritaet unsers Leibes beeintraechtigt. Wenn nun der Apostel Paulus sagt, dass Fleisch und Blut das Reich Gottes nicht ererben (1st Corinthians 15:51), so kann diess nur heissen, dass nicht dieser aus Fleisch bestehende, der Suende dienstbare, dem Tode verfallene Leib, sondern ein von Gott gemachter, von Suende und Tod nich beruehrter, geistlicher Leib ins ewige Leben eingeht (2nd Corinthians 5:1ff.). Das von dem Apostel gebrauchte Bild vom Samenkorn (1st Corinthinas 15:36) sagt doch aus, dass nicht dieser begrabene Leib auferstehe, sondern ein aus demselben hervorgegangener neuer. Und auch die Verwandlung, welche die Leiber der Lebenden erfahren, fordert einen viel groesseren Unterschied des neuen Leibes vom alten, als die alte Dogmatik aussagt, die, so zu sagen, nur eine verbesserte Gestalt des alten Leibes lehrt. Nehmen wir an, dass schon in diesem Leben der heilige Geist aus dem irdischen Leibe den Keim des Auferstehungsleibes bildet, welcher die Seele umhuellt im Zustande ihres Geisteslebens im Todtenreiche, so haben wir uns die Auferstehung als einen schoepferischen Akt zu denken, durch welchen Jesus Christus aus der Erde einen Leib bereitet, in dem jener Keim seine Vollendung findet, unser irdischer Leib aber sein Urbild [pristina
figura et species, Origenes]. Aber der Stoff, den wir begraben wird nicht auferstehen,” Die lutherische Dogmatik, Band III (Verlag Dörffling & Franke, Leipzig 1868), Seiten 569.
It is true that when we say the resurrection-bodies will be idem numero with the body that was buried, we apply this statement to all the members of the body which in their sum total constitute an entire body. However, as to such particles, which a body in its healthy growth casts off, and which hence do not enter into the conception of physical entirety, the resurrection act of God will not restore them. Nor will defects which have been caused in our physical make up – like a lost eye, hand, finger, appear in our new bodies. Deformities will have disappeared and defects will be supplied.
As to the stature of the resurrection-bodies, nothing definite can be stated, but the opinion of those is quite probable, who hold that as regards age and station the resurrection-bodies will be the same as those buried. Gerhard reviews the opinions that have been advanced on this topic. Some have argued that the resurrection-bodies will be copies of the body of Christ. They have pointed to Ephesians 4:13, where the apostle speaks of our spiritual growth thus: “Till we all come unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Jesus Christ.” Gerhard points to Revelation 18:11; 19:5; 20:12, where “the great and the small” are seen standing at the tribunal of Christ; also to 1st Corinthians 15:42, 43, where the apostle declares that there will be a difference as to the size between the resurrection-bodies, just as one star differs from another. However, the raised bodies will be fitted for a new mode of existence. At creation flesh and blood were shapen for a natural life in a material world and through sin became corruptible. The life which begins with the resurrection is supernatural and is spent in a spirit world and is incorruptible, immortal. The natural, mortal, vile body, consisting of flesh and blood is not capable of itself to assume this new mode of existence, 1st Corinthians 15:50; and must be fashioned for it by a change which will make them spiritual beings, i.e., give them bodies adapted for existence in a spirit world, 1st Corinthians 15:44, 53. This change will affect all bodies; however, not all in a like manner. All will become imperishable by this change, but the raised bodies of the wicked will exhibit marks of divine anger. They will bear the stigma of disgrace and will be assigned to a place of torment, where they will be tortured without being destroyed, Daniel 12:2; Matthew 25:41, 46; John 5:29. On the other hand, the raised bodies of the godly will exhibit marks of the divine favor. They will be “glorious bodies,” Philippians 3:21. “The image of the earthly,” 1st Corinthians 15:49, i.e., all imperfections and defects, which they bore in their natural life, will have been put aside, also all physical wants will have disappeared, Revelation 7:16. And they will “bear the image of the heavenly,” i.e., the glory which streams from the throne of heavenly majesty will pass over to them, fill them, as it were, and cause them to shine in splendor as the sun, Matthew 13:43. The nature of these new bodies of the glorified just was seen on earth at the transfiguration of the Lord, and again at His apparitions among the disciples after His resurrection. Paul states that the glorious body of the risen Christ is the prototype, the model and pattern of the future body of the saints, which shall be fashioned like unto it, Philippians 3:21.
The doctrine of the resurrection of the flesh is unknown to reason. Pagans who have entertained the idea of the soul living on after death have left the manner of the soul life in the
hereafter, and the question whether each soul will return to its former body undecided. Still it is very foolish to pronounce the teaching of the resurrection of the body unreasonable, as the infidel materialists of our day do. On the contrary, human reason is compelled to acknowledge the existence of God and therewith the retribution which shall be meted out by God’s unerring justice to the evil and the good. While human reason cannot, and when it acts wisely, will not define the mode of God’s retributive acts, it considers it not unreasonable and plausible that there will be such a retribution, and it leaves the “how “to the almighty power of God which it acknowledges. Accordingly certain would-be wise people, of whom history saith, were not reasonable at all when they denounced the resurrection of the dead; e.g., when the Athenian philosophers on Mar’s Hill called Paul’s discourse on this subject “läroodäs logos,” Acts 17:32, when Pliny calls it “puerilia deliriamenta,” and says: “Quae malum ista dementia est iterari vitam morte?” when Aeschylus says: “Hapax thanontos ouk estin anastasis,” when Theocritus writes: “Non est spes ulla sepultis,” when Catullus (ad Lesb.) says: “Soles occidere et redire possunt; nobis cum semel occidit brevis lux, nox est perpetuo una dormienda.” The Bible has recorded few particular heresies, though it denounces all; but on the matter of the resurrection of the dead, we find that as far back as the days of Isaiah there were people whose life-motto was: “Behold joy and gladness, slaying oxen and killing sheep, eating flesh and drinking wine: let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we shall die,” 22:13. In the apocryphal book of the Wisdom of Solomon we read: “The ungodly said, reasoning with themselves, but not aright, Our life is short and tedious, and in the death of a man there is no remedy; neither was there any man known to have returned from the grave,” 2:1. The cavil of the Sadducees about this teaching is noted Matthew 22:23; Mark 12:18; Luke 20:27; Acts 23:6, 8, and that of Hymeneus and Philetus in 2nd Timothy 2:17, 18, and of certain people in the church of Corinth, in 1st Corinthians 15:12. In the early church the resurrection of the dead was denied by the Simonians (followers of Simon Magis), Carpocrates, Saturnians, Basilists, Dositheus and the Valentinians. Augustine remarked: “In nulla re sic contradicitur christianae fidei, quam in resurrectione carnis,” and Calixtus reports: Quantum ex auctoribus et historia colligis priorum saeculorum haeretici fere omnes ad hunc lapidem impegerunt? In later times we find Amaleric, the Parisian theologian, the Albigensians, Pope John XXIII, the Libertines, the Socinians and the Arminians either deny the resurrection of the body utterly or question its possibility. That all who deny this article of the Christian faith are outside of the Christian Church needs no additional proof.

§182. The Final Judgment.

The resurrection of the dead and the transformation of the living at the time of the second advent of Christ fits men for a new and eternal existence. The form of this existence will be determined by an elaborate process, which Scripture calls “dikaiokrisia tou theou,” Romans 2:5, the righteous judgment of God. Immediately after the visible return of Christ, on the same day, mankind, Acts 17:31; Revelation 11:7, will be gathered before Him. He will be conspicuous to all in the attitude of a judge at whose tribunal (“bäma,” Romans 14:10; 2nd Corinthians 5:10) justice is to be dispensed to each
individual human being. We distinguish three states of the judgment: 1) the separation of the righteous from the wicked. By the agency of His holy angels Christ will cause those who have believed in Him as the God-man and their Redeemer, to be placed at His right side, those who have refused to believe on Him at His left, Matthew 13:49; 25:32. In effecting this separation the angels are guided by the omniscience of Christ who “sends” them.
The Lord’s coming to judgment will be the climax of the wonderful act by which the two natures were united in His theanthropic person and which started His great redemptive work. Christ will come as the Son of Man, i.e., “in assumpta humanitate,” Baier. Gerhard: “Christ will hold this court not only as God, but also as man. As Judge He will be visible and conspicuous (in His glorious appearance and sitting in His judgment seat) and He will render a decision that is audible…. The Judge’s decision will not only be heard inwardly in the conscience, but also outwardly in the form of certain words.” This decision will be rendered with that divine authority, which belongs alike to each person of the Holy Trinity, and to the man Christ by communication. The Holy Trinity is for this reason called the causa efficiens of the last judgment. In John 5:22 we read indeed that “the Father judgeth no man,” viz., by appearing in person and rendering a decision, but the same text connects the Father with the judgment, by declaring that He has given all judgment to the Son. Again, in Acts 17:31, we are told that: “God will judge the earth by one man” etc., and in Romans 2:3, 5, 6, 13; Hebrews 12:23 God is called the “Judge of all the world.” The Calvinist and Papist theologians, who are never in earnest in teaching the theanthropic character of the person of Christ and the communion of the natures in Him, limit greatly the authority of the human nature, or the man Christ, in the last judgment. According to their view, the human nature accomplishes no more than any purely human being could be expected to accomplish by its human ability. It is only when aided by the divine that the human nature performs superhuman feats in this judgment. Such a view is at the base Nestorianizing.
That the divine attribute of justice enters strongly into the action of the last judgment has already been noted. The justice of God has been called the causa impulsiva interna of the judgment, and this justice is exhibited in its two aspects of iustitia remunerativa and iustitia vindicativa, the former showing God’s goodness, the latter His righteous anger. The causa impulsiva extrema is, on the one hand, the merit of Christ apprehended by the believer’s faith, and on the other hand, the sins and in particular the final impenitence of unbelievers. Faith is rewarded, unbelief punished, at the judgment.
The dogmaticians also note a causa ministerialis minus principalis of the judgment. By this they mean that Christ will have the saints and the good angels as associates with Him in this judgment. The office of the angels will be to accompany Christ when He comes to judge and to announce His coming with an immense shout, to congregate both the raised dead and the transformed survivors on that day from all parts of the world, to separate the godly from the ungodly, placing the former at His right, the latter at His lift side, and finally to hurl the damned into the infernum. The saints will act as witnesses and approvers of the judgment of Christ, though they themselves must also be judged, as will be seen. They are represented as being in an elevated place and close to Christ, the apostles coming first, then the patriarchs, then the martyrs,
and the rest of the teachers and faithful of Christ’s flock, while the wicked stand before this assembly in a lower place.
The dogmaticians distinguish an obiectum materiale and formale of the judgment. By the former they understand the persons to be judged, also called the subiectum quod, or the subiectum iudicandum; by the latter, the things for which each person is to be judged, also called the subiectum quo.
The material object of the judgment are all men, both the godly and the ungodly, whether they are still living on that day or are raised from the dead; and besides these also the evil angels. Some of the ancient fathers held that neither believers nor unbelievers would be judged, but medii, i.e., persons who are neither in one nor the other, as if there could be such persons! Occasionally, too, the view has been expressed that the good angels will be judged.
The obiectum formale is faith or unbelief as far as either are seen by the works of men. These same items were introduced as the causa impulsiva externa, and it is necessary now to keep apart in our mind two lines of thought, viz., in what respect faith and unbelief cause God to usher in the judgment, and in what respect faith and unbelief are the very things to be judged. This is especially necessary in regard to the faith of the godly, lest we construe a merit out of their work which the Judge will commend.
2. The iudicium discussionis. Before this divided assembly Christ will reveal Himself as the Discerner of hearts (“kardiognoostäs”), and He will “bring to light the hidden things of darkness, make manifest the counsels of the heart,” 1st Corinthians 4:5, “judge the secrets of men,” Romans 2:16, and review their doings during their earthly life, Romans 2:6; 2nd Corinthians 5:10; Matthew 25:34. Scripture also states that men will be made to give an account of themselves, and indicates that Christ will reply to questions put to Him, Matthew 7:22, 23; 20:11-15. The purpose of this process is not to inform the Judge, but to make manifest to all men the righteousness of the judgment. The faith of each individual will be decided on an objective basis, viz., his life and actions here on earth, whether they be good or bad. These actions have attested the state of men’s hearts, their internal relation to God, their faith or unbelief, Galatians 5:6; John 13:35. And it is really this relation of each man to God that will be judged according to Mark 16:16. This description which Christ Himself gives of the judgment in Matthew 25 shows that these works of men will be exhibited for public scrutiny which characterize their spiritual condition of either side, the wicked works of unbelievers and the good works of believers. The sins of the believers will not be mentioned, though the believers themselves will certainly be conscious of them and recognize that it is only by the grace of God that they are found on the right side of Christ. For they have been assured that their “transgressions have been blotted out,” Isaiah 43:25, and “shall not be mentioned unto them,” Ezekiel 18:22. Yea, the very strong expression is used in this connection: “I will not remember their sins,” Isaiah 43:25, that is to say: God will interpose His gracious will, His love, between the believers’ sins and His own omniscience. Hence, John encourages his readers to abide in faith, for it they do, there will be no reason why they will be ashamed before Christ at His coming, 1st John 2:28. Accordingly, Gerhard remarks: “The statement that all things will be made manifest in the judgment must not be understood collectively, as though the sins both of the godly and the ungodly were to be revealed to all, but distributive, viz., the
good works of the godly and the evil works of the ungodly.” The same writer calls attention that Law and Gospel must be distinguished in the statements which Scripture makes concerning the judgment. E.g. the statement: “Men shall give an account of every evil word which they have spoken” is a legal utterance, while the statement: “Lift up your heads, for your redemption draweth nigh” is an evangelical declaration. The believers are not under the Law, but under grace, also at the final judgment. This process of exhibiting the evidence which determines the Judge’s sentence serves the purpose of making plain to angels and men the strict justice of His decree. Therefore, Paul calls the day of judgment not only “hämera orgäs” but “hämera apokalypseoos dikaiokriseoos tou theou,” Romans 2:5. And Paul declares that God will judge the inhabited earth (“tän katoikoumenän”) with righteousness (“en dikaiosynä”). Righteousness will be the basis and the form of this process. And this God will do by “a man whom he hath ordained,” Acts 17:31, namely by His Son, the God-man, to whom “He hath committed all judgment,” John 5:22. The attitude which men have assumed toward Christ, His Word and work, is decisive of their faith on the last day. Accordingly, it is proper that they shall ultimately be confronted with Christ and be judged with the rest by Him.
Since the iudicium discussionis is universal, embracing both the actions of believers and unbelievers; since Scripture teaches that all men must give an account of what they have done in the body, the question has been raised whether the sins of believers will be published. In the account, which the Lord in Matthew 25:37ff. has given of the judgment, no mention is made of the sins of those on His right. But from the surprised exclamation of the believers after they have heard the Lord’s encomium upon their good works, it is rightly inferred that a memory of their sins must have obtained in these people, for the praise of Christ appears to them altogether undeserved, and incites them to a greater praise of the magnitude of the divine grace which lifted them out of their unworthy condition into such prominence. Gerhard holds that the statement: All things must be made manifest at the last judgment, must be understood non collective sed distributio, not so as to make the publication of all things which believers and unbelievers ever did necessary, but so as to call for the publication only of all those things which the believers did as believers, and of all those things which the unbelievers did as unbelievers. For proof, Gerhard too points to the Lord’s description of the judgment in Matthew 25. Besides Gerhard calls attention to the fact that also in our teaching regarding the judgment we must rightly divide the Law from the Gospel. Such a text, he says, as: “He that believeth doth not come into judgment,” is Gospel; a text like this: “You heap up wrath for yourselves against the day of the just judgment of God” is Law; such a text as: “Lift up your heads, because your redemption draweth night” is Gospel. He concludes that the righteousness of Christ, which the believers have appropriated by faith covers all their sins, and renders them invisible to God, the angels and men. The scholastic theologians of the middle ages and the Papists of our day, for reasons that can easily be imagined, hold that also the sins of believers will be published in the last judgment. Also the Lutheran Fecht held that the sins of the elect, together with their repentance would be exhibited in the last day.
3. The iudicium retributionis. This consists in the pronouncing of the Judge’s sentence, and the removal to the
respective abiding place in eternity. It is either a judgment of absolution or of condemnation, and decrees either joy or grief, everlasting punishment or life eternal, Matthew 25:34, 41, 46. The norm according to which the decision is rendered is, in the one case, the Gospel, in the other, the Law. This distinction between iudicium discussionis and retributionis is merely a notional one; in reality both are one.

§183. The End of the World.

The sentence of the Judge having been rendered, the end of time, John 6:40, 44; 11:24 (“the last day”) and of all things (“the end,” 1st Corinthians 15:24, “the end of the world,” Matthew 24:3, 14; 13:39) has arrived. The form which the end of all things will assume is described in Scripture as one of destruction and ruin by the agency of fire. The stellar bodies will become defunct, and the forces and laws which governed them will be disjointed, Matthew 24:29; Mark 13:24-26; the material universe, heaven, earth, sea, and the elements shall be annihilated. Scripture uses a number of synonymous terms and phrases to express this catastrophe: “they shall pass away” (“parerchomai,” Matthew 5:18; Luke 21:33; 2nd Peter 3:10; Revelation 21:1); “they shall perish” (“abad,” Psalm 102:26; “apollymi,” Hebrews 1:11); “no place is found for them” (“topos ouch heurethä autois,” Revelation 20:11); “they cease to exist,” (“ouk estin eti,” Revelation 21:1); they are reserved unto fire (“pyri täroumenoi,” 2nd Peter 3:7); “they shall melt with fervent heat” (“kausoumena lythäsontai,” 2nd Peter 3:10; “kausoumena täketai,” 2nd Peter 3:12); “being on fire they shall be dissolved” (“pyroumenoi luthäsontai,” 2nd Peter 3:12); “they shall be burnt up” (“katakaäsetai,” 2nd Peter 3:10).
The consummation of the present universe will be followed by the creation of a new heaven and a new earth. The former heaven and earth will be utterly forgotten, Isaiah 65:17; Revelation 21:1. This new heaven and earth will endure forever, Isaiah 66:22, and will be an abode of righteousness, a sinless world, 2nd Peter 3:13.
On the strength of Romans 8:19ff.; Psalm 102:26, 27 (Hebrews 1:10, 11) the question has been debated whether the consummation of the universe will not rather be a change only of the form and external appearance of the present world. In the former passage the apostle speaks of “the earnest expectation of the creature which waits for the manifestation of the sons of God,” he speaks of a hope of the creature world for its deliverance from (“apo”) the bondage of corruption into (“eis”) the glorious liberty of the sons of God, and of a groaning and travailing of the whole creation. The two prepositions “apo” and “eis” indicate, indeed, the termini of a change through which a being passes. The latter passages speak of a change of the heavens, as of a garment. The language of all these passages is poetic, that in Romans 8:19ff. very prominently so, and serious obstacles present themselves to a literal acceptation of the language of the apostle and the psalmist. Luther, in his sermons on the epistle lesson for the IV Dominica post trinitatem in the Church Postil, interprets the passage so as to hold a destruction only of the form (“schäma”) not of the substance (“ousia”) of the universe, and a number of theologians of our church have adopted his view. But Luther has accepted the opposite view also: “Die jetzige Welt ist nur eine Verbreitung und Gerueste Gottes zu jener Welt; wenn das
Haus fertig ist, so reisst man das Gerueste ein.” The question whether Romans 8:19 teaches a transformation has been regarded in our church as a problema theologicum. Gerhard: “Sententiam de substantiali mundi ‘phthora’ seu interitu non defendimus ut fidei articulum scitu ac creditu simpliciter necessarium, sed eam emphaticis Scripturae, dictis, quae de fine mundi loquuntur, magis conformem esse, dicimus.”
Kromayer reviewing the arguments from Romans 8:19ff. of those who hold that the world will perish only secundum accidentia, non secundum substantiam, holds that the liberation of the brute creature of which that text tells is effected not by a change to a better condition, but by annihilation and abolition. “The creature,” he says, “would rather not exist than be subject to the abuse of men, contrary to the will of the Creator.” The groaning and anxious waiting which the apostle predicates of irrational creatures he regards as prosopopoeia, i.e., poetical impersonation. The argument from Psalm 102:25-28, when God is said to change the heavens like a garment declines by saying that the true change is of such a wide scope as to embrace also annihilation, and the very text suggests this sort of a change by the comparison of the heavens with an old threadbare garment, which is changed by being thrown away. As to Luther’s remark, “Die Welt habe jetzt das Werkeltagskleid an, einst werde sie das Feier- oder Sonntagskleid anhaben,” Kromayer holds that Luther’s tertium comparationis in this remark is merely the difference between the present and the future world, and he says nothing in this remark about the mode of the action by which we pass from the old to the new conditions. Many of the fathers, the scholastic theologians, some Calvinists and Lutherans like Brenz, Althauer, Philipp Nicolai and our Dr. Stoeckhardt have held the belief that this world will not be annihilated but transformed.
As regards the new heavens which God will create, a remark of Gerhard deserves attention. He says: “The term ‘the heaven of the blessed’, coelum beatorum, can be understood in a threefold sense: 1) objective and efficienter, and then that heaven is God the Creator Himself; 2) formaliter, and then that heaven is something distinct from God, viz., the heavenly glory and joy of the saints; however, this is not some corporeal substance; 3) subiective, and then that heaven is a locality, about the condition, location, characteristics of which Scripture has revealed nothing.” He concludes with the practical remark: “Ideo praestat, de eius possessione, quam accurata definitione, in hac vita sollicitum esse.”

§184. Eternal Damnation.

The separation of the evil from the good which took place before the throne of Christ will be continued after the Judge has pronounced His sentence, each party passing into a separate existence. Those who were damned will enter upon an endless season of punishment. The punishment will be 1) of a privative nature (mala privativa), consisting in the loss of all that happiness which God had originally designed also for those who are finally lost (poena damni). The different treatment already, which the evil receive during the iudicium discussionis will bring this part of their punishment home to the damned, and the consciousness of their irreparable loss will accompany them into the state of damnation, as the parable of the rich glutton, Luke 18, who views and is told of the happiness of
Lazarus, shows. The continued activity of their own conscience will also keep the consciousness of this part of their punishment alive in the damned. The privative side of eternal damnation is also called “the second death,” Revelation 2:11; 20:6; for death, too, is a privation, viz., of life. And by eternal damnation the damned are deprived of the other life.
Chief among the mala privativa of the damned is one that has reference to the intellect: the absence of the beatific vision of God, and of the light of glory that is bestowed upon the blessed. The commentators find this malum privativum indicated in such phrases of Scripture as “not seeing life,” John 3:36, “never seeing light,” Psalm 49:19, “being cast out into darkness,” Matthew 8:12, “to go away from Christ,” Matthew 25:41, “to be left,” Luke 17:34. While the damned will be without the lumen gloriae and the lumen gratiae, which they despised in their life, [which] naturally ceased for [them] in death, they will retain the lumen naturae, the light of their natural reason. Luther rightly says: “In den Verdammten bleibt dasselbige vernuenftige Licht, ja, es wird nur heller, dass sie Mehr davon gequaelt werden,” XI, 256. The damned recognize keenly the justice of God which is meted out to them in their punishments and their fatal folly in despising God’s grace. As a consequence of this malum privativum, there will be in the damned no love of God as the highest good and none of that joy which springs from the love of God.
Another malum privativum relates to the bodies of the damned. The transfiguration of the bodies of the saints, with their clarity, agility, impassibility, will not be accorded the damned, for such a glory has been promised only to believers. However, the bodies of the damned will be imperishable, and thus become to them an inexhaustible source of suffering. When we speak of the bodies of the damned as “spiritual,” the term is to be understood in a wide sense and as opposed to their animal bodies, which require food and clothing. The bodies of the damned will also be deformed, uncouth, abominable sights. For just as the glory of the blessed will be reflected also by their bodies, so likewise the shame and disgrace of the damned.
Among the mala positiva of the damned there is usually named first that perception which their intellect has of God as the supreme Ruler and just Judge. This knowledge the damned obtain by mental abstraction from viewing their condition. This knowledge abashes the damned. [In] Revelation 6:17 we are told that they behold God sitting upon His throne, i.e., they recognize His indisputable overlordship over them, but they cannot bear to look upon His threatening countenance. To know God thus is certainly extreme misery.
The damned also study themselves; they contemplate the multitude and gravity of their sins, and the merited, bitter and ever enduring punishment, which is being meted out to them on that account. In the apocryphal book of the Wisdom of Solomon, in chapter 5 there is a drastic scene portrayed how the damned bewail their stupidly and folly in this life. The damned have knowledge of the bliss of the saints. That the damned will see (“spectabunt,” Baier) the blessed, cannot be established from Scripture. Gerhard expresses the limits of the knowledge of the damned under this head by saying that they know beatorum felicitatem non quidem in specie et “praktikoos,” interim tamen in genere as “theoorätikoos,” i.e., while they do not actually behold the blessed individuals they have a general conception of their happiness by noticing their
absence among the damned and by remembering what was told them of heaven while they were still living.
The mala positiva, however, are exhibited in most frightful form in the will of the damned. They are filled with hatred against God, whom they regard as their implacable enemy. They also detest themselves, because they know that they have caused their own misery. Then there is in them envy of their former fellowmen; pain, grief, anxiety, because of the vast multitude of evils, and the climax of all their woe is a restless impatience and despair. That the damned hate God is indicated in the great aversion, Revelation 6:16, 17, which they have for God. Moreover, it can be shown by this reasonable and Scriptural argument: the will of man is never neutral in its relation to God; hence since the maned [sic] do not love, therefore they hate God. Besides, we know from Romans 8:7 that the unbelievers hate God in this life, how much more when they have become confirmed in wickedness in the life to come. The damned cannot but be utterly displeased with themselves and spend their time in self-accusations. The mental anguish of the damned is expressed in Romans 2:9 by “thlipsis kai stenochooria,” “tribulation and anguish,” and their great anxiety by Revelation 9:6, where they are said to “seek death” and “desire to die.” The question whether the damned retain the faith and hope which they had in this life, is described by Gerhard thus: “1) saving faith, consisting in knowledge, assent and confidence, there plainly cannot be in the damned, otherwise they would not be damned. 2) Whether they retain their historical knowledge, we may well doubt, because 1st Corinthians 13:8 states that “knowledge shall cease.” If the violence of sickness and pain in this life causes men to lose their knowledge of earthly matters, how much more will the infernal torments cause them to lose the knowledge of divine matters. 3) There will be in the damned, just as in the devils, assent to that article of faith, which states the existence of God and represents God as the Avenger of wrong. However, this assent will be constrained and wrung from the damned by the feeling of their torments. Augustine says in his treatise “de fide et operibus”: “Fides daemoniorum exprimitur per timorem.” 4) What James says about the faith of devils can readily be referred to this present life, in this wise, that while this life endures and before the devils with the unbelievers are cast into the infernal fire, they believe that there is a God, by whom they will one day be hurled into hell; but when they actually feel their torments, they will no longer believe, but know by experience that there is a God. 5) The damned know that they must be tormented forever, not by a supernatural act of faith, but because of the Judge’s sentence passed on them in the moment of death and on the last day. 6) There will, then, be in the damned continuous and perpetual despair, hence, no hope. For the least hope would alleviate the magnitude of their suffering.
Being confirmed in wickedness the damned cannot but sin ceaselessly (indesinenter peccant). All their actions displease God continually. The damned remain moral beings, subject to the Law of God. Now they are never of such a moral quality as God desires moral beings to be. Hence on their part they are always in a state of sin. The law which demands supreme love of God and a love of our fellowmen equal to that of ourselves obligates men as long as they exist, whether they live here in time or hereafter in eternity. Ubi “anomia,” ibi peccatum, Baier. However, the majority of our Lutheran teachers decline the idea that the damned are permitted by
external acts to blaspheme God. Revelation 16:11 refers not to the damned in hell, but to the wicked on earth; for it says that God punishes them here.
The imperishable bodies of the damned suffer pain by fire, Isaiah 66:24; Mark 9:43ff. Scripture describes this fire in a very realistic manner; 1) it mentions “the flame,” Luke 16:24; its fuel, “brimstone,” Revelation 20:10; 14:11; its “smoke,” Revelation 14:11; its scorching and painful effects, Luke 16:24; Revelation 14:10. For this reason, the fire of hell has been regarded as a material fire, such as our earthly fire. But the reason is not sufficient to make out a proof, because, according to 2nd Peter 3:20 all material substances are destroyed in the conflagration of the universe; 2) according to Matthew 25:41 the fire will be everlasting, hence would require an inexhaustible supply of fuel; 3) according to the same passage and others, the fire is prepared for the devil and his angels, who are spirits and must be punished by means adapted to their spiritual existence. 4) The Scriptures also speak of a worm which torments the damned, and nobody understands this expression to mean a material worm. For these reasons, Aegid. Hunnius, Gerhard, Dannhauer, Quenstedt incline to the belief that the fire of hell will be of an immaterial sort, though they do not deny that it is possible for God to torment spirits by a material fire. They also point to the fact that in Matthew 25:41, 46 the two expressions “everlasting fire” and “everlasting punishment” are used interchangeably and that the joys of heaven are figuratively described as a wedding and a banquet. They regard the description which Scripture gives of hell as an effort to express in our feeble language the very severe tortures which will be inflicted upon the damned. Gerhard concludes: “Praestat, omni studio per veram ac seriam conversionem de fugiendo igne esse solicitum, quam de natura illius ignis odiose et otiose digladiari.”
Mental tortures are indicated in Daniel 12:2. “Shame and everlasting contempt” overwhelm the damned, because they are made to recognize the folly of their waywardness and stubbornness, the stupidity with which they sinned, the hideousness and multitude of their offenses. Mark 9:48 pictures them as suffering the remorseless gnawing of an evil conscience, Matthew 8:12 as weeping and gnashing their teeth, both from dissolute despair and unutterable grief and from impotent rage and hatred of God, whom they continue to resist and abhor, for that grace which alone can change the enmity of a sinner’s heart toward God is denied them, James 2:13, in eternity and they continue sinning and blaspheming God without end.
It is certain from the account which Scripture gives of the state of the damned that their torments will affect all their faculties of body and soul. But the minute description of the horrors of corporeal and mental sufferings, which poets and others have attempted, how the various senses of sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch, become affected in hell, cannot be substantiated from Scripture and the theologian cannot offer any information on this subject to the curious questioners.
The punishment of the damned includes a number of external evils. They are forced to associate with foul and hideous spirits and are shrouded in darkness, Matthew 8:12, 25, 41.
Whenever the doctrine of eternal damnation has to be presented according to [the] causal method (Kausalmethode) of the dogmaticians, the following terms are employed: as to
the causa efficiens, there is none, if eternal damnation is viewed merely as a privation of the eternal bliss; when it is studied in its positive torments, the soul abandoned by God, the evil angels and the infernal fire may be called the causa efficiens. But when eternal damnation is viewed per modum poenae, the causa efficiens is the triune God, as whose agent the God-man, Jesus Christ, acts. The causa impulsiva interna is the vindictive justice of God; the causa impulsiva externa, the sins of the damned, especially willful sins, and chiefly, final infidelity. Every sin, whether original or actual is in its nature damnable. We must never speak of any sin in such a way as to minimize its punishable character. Omne peccatum de merito damnat. However, as an actual fact (actu) there is only one sin that damns: final impenitence and infidelity. Increditas finalis est adaequata causa damnationis. When this is not maintained there is danger that the redeeming work of Christ is not given full credit. Luther: “Durch Christum ist die Erbsuende aufgehoben und verdammt nach Christi Zukunft niemand, ohne wer sie nicht lassen, d.h., wer nicht glauben will,” marginal gloss to John 15:22. Hence we gather that the subiectum quod of eternal damnation, or those who will be damned, are homines impii finaliter increduli, and the subiectum quo their souls and bodies.
Regarding the location of the infernum most Lutheran dogmaticians hold that no physical location is intended by what Scripture says about hell, but that hell is an illocal “pou” (somewhere), “pou damnatorum.” Hell is where God reveals Himself in His vindictive justice to the finally impenitent. The notion that hell is located in the center of the earth lacks Scriptural basis. Ephesians 4:9, which has been cited to prove this notion, does not speak of the locality of the damned but of the grave and the state of Christ’s deepest humiliation, as the contrast between the exaltation and humiliation of Christ in the context shows. Baier: “Locum inferni quaerere aut definire velle in hac vita, inutiliter curiosum est, quod autem certus locus damnatis destinatus sit, non est dubium.” Quenstedt: “‘Pou’ inferni certum est, distinctum a ‘pou’ beatorum et ab eo longo intervallo separatum, Lucas 16:26. Quale vero et ubi illud ‘pou’ sit, non constat.” Fechtius: “Nec liquet, ubi sit infernus, qui tamen, quia ‘paratus’ est, Matthaeum 25:41.” All our Lutheran dogmaticians join Chrysostum in his warning: “Mä dsätoomen, pou estin, alla poos pheugoomen.”
The punishment of the damned is eternal in a twofold sense, viz., that it suffers no interruption and that it has no end. The cup of the wine of wrath which they are made to drain contains no mixture that would alleviate their suffering, Revelation 14:10. Their torments are never relaxed, by day or by night, so that they can obtain no rest, Revelation 14:11. Not a drop of water, not the least refreshment or recreation is granted them, Luke 16:24. Their judgment is without mercy, James 2:13. And their fire is never quenched, Isaiah 66:24, their worm never dies, Mark 9:48, it is “burning forever and ever,” Revelation 20:10.
Modern theology, taking up the exploded claims of ancient heretics has attempted to enervate these clear passages which teach an absolute eternity of infernal torments, by claiming that they must be understood conditionally, namely, the damned will suffer without end if they do not repent and become converted. Others teach that the infernal punishment will be relatively eternal, namely, the damned will be released from their worst torments, but they will always undergo a slight suffering. These views presuppose gracious
operations of the Spirit also in hell, or they proceed from the Pelagian standpoint that man can convert himself by his own effort. They also assume that the aim of the infernal punishment is not retribution but correction. These views are futile, because the iudicium discussionis will have established the perfect justice of God in rejecting the damned whom neither the consequences of their sins which were visited upon them in their earthly life, nor the persistent offers of God’s grace could turn from their course. The sentence of damnation pronounced upon them brands them as incorrigible. Hase: “The effeminate spirit of our times does not dare to conceive of the seriousness of evil.”
Ancient and modern theologians have denied the eternity of infernal punishments by teaching an ultimate restitution of all things, “apokatastasis toon pantoon,” by which they understand a restoration of the entire universe, hell included to its original condition in the state of innocence before the fall. The Scripture passages, however, which are being cited in behalf of this view (Matthew 19:28; Acts 3:21; 1st Corinthians 15:26ff.; 2nd Peter 3:7) only teach the final victory of the Kingdom of God, the subjugation of all enemies to Christ, and do not state that all his enemies will be made his friends. If this were possible, and should we know in advance that it would happen, would we have a reason to be so severe in denouncing and condemning evildoers in this life?
The teaching of ultimate annihilation of the damned also destroys the teaching of the eternity of infernal torments. The expression in Matthew 10:28 (“destroy body and soul in hell”) cannot be urged against the array of passages which teach endless suffering. The verb “destroy” is here used with the same force as when Scripture speaks of the entire state of the damned as destruction and perdition. Gerhard: “If the wicked had not any more serious punishment to fear than being reduced to nothing, it is not apparent why it would have been better for them never to have been born.” (See Synodalbericht of the Texas District.)
Inasmuch as the sins of the damned differ both as to quality and quantity, and inasmuch as the judgment serves the purpose of giving to each according to his works, there will also be different degrees of punishment in hell, Matthew 10:15; 11:22, 23; 23:13; Luke 12:47, 48. However, Scripture does not say in what way the infernal torments will be mitigated or increased for individual persons. Regarding the fate of infants born outside of the church, Quenstedt suspends his judgment and cites 1st Corinthians 5:13. As regards the fate of children of Christians who die unbaptized the consensus of opinion in our church (Tarnow excepted) is that we should not rashly say they are damned, nor that they are saved, but we may entertain hope for them, because they have been commended to God by prayer and are not guilty of a contempt of the sacrament. Article 2 of the Augsburg Confession does not teach that all unbaptized children are damned, but only that original sin is damnable.
It is necessary that the theologian be very careful and guarded in his utterances on this subject. Scripture does not offer the least ground that children of heathens are saved by extraordinary grace, a claim so often advanced with the greatest confidence. Our most careful theologians, accordingly, warn against discussing this question, because one enters rationalistic territory in taking it up. The wisest course to be followed is that of Paul, who declines to judge them “that are without,” and leaves their fate in God’s hands. If a definite
hope is expressed regarding the infants of heathen, that hope must be extended logically also to adults. As regards unbaptized infants it is true that a Scriptural analogy might be pointed out for N. T. possibilities, by citing the fact, that in the O. T. girls were not circumcised, and yet became members of the church and were saved. But even this analogy does not amount to absolute proof. It only indicates to us that God has ways of saving a sinner which He has not told us. He has bound us to the order of salvation which He has laid down for all, but He has not in the same manner restricted Himself. While it is blasphemy to despise common grace and expect ordinary grace to be increased to extraordinary grace, it would be equally blasphemous to limit God’s gracious dealing with men, and deny that He can do a certain thing.
Even this awful doctrine of Scripture ultimately tends to the glorification of God. Hence dogmaticians say: “Finis damnationis ex parte Dei iudicis est iustitiae vindicativae, veracitatis et potentiae divinae gloria,” Baier. It is terrible, indeed, in this manner to have to contribute toward the increasing of the glory of the same God, who desired to be glorified by us as the God of all grace.

§185. Eternal Life.

The fact that there is a life eternal in which man, according to his soul and body, will attain to the highest bliss, can be ascertained only from Scripture. We find among the Gentiles dim and inaccurate views of a future happiness which have been expressed in what the heathen have said about the reward which good men may expect after this life, about the immortality of the soul, the Elysian fields etc. But the knowledge which has found expression in these facts is imperfect and begets only a languid assurance and assent, and vanishes entirely in the greater adversities to which man is exposed in this life. Plato is the exponent of heathen thought on this matter, when in his Phaedon he says: “To men saphes eidenai peri täs mellousäs dzooäs en too nyn bioo ä adynaton estin, ä panchalipon.” Accordingly, the remarks which are occasionally heard about the universal and natural tendency (of beings possessed of a will of their own) towards happiness, must not be referred to the happiness of the everlasting life at once, but to happiness in general. If the term “happiness” is taken in its special sense, namely as consisting in the vision of God, happiness is neither desired by all nor do all strive for it.
The eternal state of the blessed is the formal end (finis formalis) of theology, the arrival at the highest good, the consummation of God’s merciful decree of predestination. The chosen sons of God enter upon their eternal inheritance which was appointed them before the foundation of the world, Acts 20:32; Ephesians 1:14; Hebrews 1:14; 9:15; 1st Peter 1:4, 5, 9. In this state they have become fitted for enjoying fully the divine goodness. They are sinless and impeccable, Hebrews 12:23; 2nd Timothy 4:8; 1st Peter 1:4 (“anahartäsia,” impeccabilitas), all the effects of sin, such as physical and mental suffering, have disappeared, Isaiah 25:8; 35:10; 60:20; 49:10; Revelation 7:16, 17; 21:4; death, Luke 20:36; Isaiah 25:8; Romans 7:24; 1st Corinthians 15:26, 54; Revelation 20:14; Revelation 21:4, and the danger of falling away from God, 1st Thessalonians 4:17; Revelation 3:5, 12, have disappeared, status confirmationis. These are known as the privative blessings of the saints made perfect (bona privativa). The
positive blessings are 1) the beatific vision of God, especially of the glorified Son of God, Philippians 1:23. By a clear perception and by an immediate process the blessed will, with their glorified eyes, Job 19:26, and their illumined intellect, behold God “as he is,” 1st John 3:2; Matthew 5:8. 2) participation in the glory of God, 2nd Timothy 2:10; 1st Peter 5:10, not in such a manner as to raise the blessed to equality with God, but so as to raise them inconceivably and unalterably above the limitations of the present life, 2nd Corinthians 4:17; Romans 8:17, 18, 30, and to adorn them also outwardly with exquisite splendor, Revelation 3:5. 3) joy, exultation and conjubilation, Psalm 16:11; Isaiah 35:10. To these blessings must be added a beautiful abode, Hebrews 12:22, and the enjoyable companionship of the holy angels, Matthew 18:10. “Man attains to a possession of God as the highest good in this way that God is rendered intimately present to man’s intellect by a most perfect act of cognition,” Baier.
This cognition is the quintessence of heaven’s bliss. By beholding God, man is blessed. While in this life God was known only through the medium of the Word, hence, as it were, in an image (cognitio abstractiva). He exhibits Himself to the blessed in the future life unveiled, immediately, face to face (cognitio intuitiva, clara). This visio beatifica, as it is called, is the cause of the complete happiness of the blessed and of their becoming confirmed in good to such an extent that they can no more fall away from God. The completeness of the enjoyment, which the blessed derive from beholding God excludes the desire for any other good. “Whenever Holy Writ or writers in the Church state that eternal blessedness consists in the vision and cognition of God, they do not mean a mere act of the intellect but also an act of the will, hence the full attainment and possession of that highest good, which is accomplished by knowledge and life eternal. For quite frequently in the Hebrew language words expressing knowledge connote the accompanying affections and affects. Hence Bonaventura says: The three acti gloriosi seu beatifici, viz., the perfect vision, the perfect love and perfect enjoyment of God are connected one with another, and because of their coherence, we attribute to one what belongs to all; happiness, however is rather attributed to the vision for this reason, because in this vision man’s status patriae becomes distinct from his status viae, which cannot be said of love, because we practice love of God both here and hereafter,” Gerhard. The beatific vision is called an actus vitalis of the intellect. Now by itself, the intellect is not proportionate and adequate at all to this immense task of knowing God perfectly. Here on earth our natural intellect had to be illumined by the lumen gratiae for that imperfect knowledge which we obtained of God, knowing Him and things divine, is through a glass darkly; in heaven our intellect will depend on the lumen gloriae as the principle of its cognition of God. Baier calls the lumen gloriae a “habitus quidam spiritualis, intellectui supernaturaliter infusus eumque ultra vices suas naturales ad Deum in se clare cognoscendum elevans.” It is called a light, because it renders to the intellect, which is the eye of the mind the same service which our proper lights, e.g., that of the sun, by illuminating the air and causing the colors to shine, renders to our bodily eye and enables it to see and recognize images received by its working. It is called the light of glory, because it has God who is our glory for its object, and makes us glorious, as Moses’ face was made to shine from his conversation with God, Exodus 34:29.
The vision beatific, says Baier, is not a free but a necessary act, which the blessed never will cease to engage in, nor be able to cease, both as regards the exercitum and the species of the act. What he means is this, that the blessed neither can nor want to turn from the object of their contemplation. Like the angels, they always “dia pantos,” behold the face of their Father, which is in heaven.
The new perception, cognition and knowledge of the blessed will extend to objects outside of God. “In the future life,” says Gerhard, “there will come a perfect cognition of God and divine mysteries. Then we shall fully and perfectly know those things to the intuitive and clear knowledge of which we could not attain in this life, e.g., how God is one in essence, triune in persons; how the Son of God was begotten of the Father in eternity; how the Holy Spirit from eternity proceeds from the Father and the Son; why the Son of God not the Father, nor the Holy Ghost, assumed the human nature; why our Mediator had to be God and man; how the divine and human nature are personally united in Christ; how God created all things out of nothing; on what day He created the angels, etc. Then we shall know fully and perfectly the reasons for the counsels and works of God, viz., of creation, redemption, sanctification, resurrection and glorification; how God created man in His measureless wisdom, preserved him by His ineffable goodness, redeemed him by His infinite mercy; how His eternal omnipotence has defended the Church against her enemies and has quickened the believers out of death to everlasting life. Then we shall fully and perfectly know the nature of the new heaven and the new earth, and hence, shall know the inmost qualities of the furthest recesses in all creatures; then we shall no more complain like the stork in Aesop’s fable that we are touching the glass but cannot reach the meal, but we shall, by a ready intuition of the mind behold the more hidden forms and properties of things. For if Adam by the light of his concreated wisdom could understand the nature of the animals so exactly that he could give names suited to each one of them, and was aware that Eve, whom he had not seen before was built out of his own flesh and blood, how much more shall the blessed being illumined by the divine light, be able to behold perfectly the mysteries of heaven and earth…. Augustine says: What is now hidden from us will there be manifest; there the reason will appear why this one was elected, that one rejected, why this one was raised to royal dignity, that one forced into servitude, why one died in his mother’s womb, another in infancy, another in youth, another in old age, why one became poor, another rich; why the son of an adulteress received baptism, while the son of the legitimate wife died before baptism. All these and many similar things in the book of life, i.e., of eternal truth and highest wisdom, will be plain and manifest to all. There all will mutually understand their thoughts etc.”
And thus by the vision beatific we will become “homoion autoo,” God-like. Our will will be drawn in intense love to God, and enjoy Him to such an extent that it becomes fixed in holiness and can no longer fall away from God and sin. “Deus est ipsa lux,” exclaims Gerhard enthusiastically, as the prospect of the eternal vision opens up before him, “essentialis beatitudo; ergo ex visione Dei electi participant vitam, lucem et beatitudinem. Summum bonum perfecte cognitum non potest non amari; ergo ex visione Dei oritur perfecta Dei delectio. Summum bonum perfecte cognitum et amatum non potest non
laudari et glorificari; quod enim quis amat, illud laudat; ergo ex visione et delectione Dei oritur glorificatio et exaltatio.”
In these blessings body and soul of the elect will participate, their entire being, as it was raised from corruption and prepared for the new state. And this state with all its accompanying features will endure without end, Matthew 25:46; 2nd Timothy 2:10. Eternal life, glory and bliss will be equally perfect in all the elect, Matthew 13:43; 2nd Corinthians 12:2, 4; 13:10, 12; 2nd Timothy 4:18, but there will be degrees of glory in heaven, 1st Corinthians 15:41, 42, in accordance with the difference of the works of righteousness, which believers performed while in their state of probation, Matthew 25:14-23; 10:42; 19:19; Mark 9:41; 2nd Corinthians 9:6; Revelation 14:13; 22:12. Grace which actuated the elect in their earthly life will then crown all its works in the realm of glory, when Christ will be all in all, and will render unto each of His servants such a reward of grace as will fully satisfy him, despite the difference in glory which he beholds in others. The Lord promised His disciples that they would see each other in glory and joy, John 16:22; 17:24. Hebrews 12:23 speaks of a vision of the church of the firstborn, and of the spirits of just men made perfect. Peter on the Mount of Transfiguration, when he was vouchsafed a brief foretaste of heaven, recognized Moses and Elijah whom he had never seen before. The divine image being restored in heaven, those powers of the intellect by which Adam in paradise at once recognized Eve will also have been restored. Upon these grounds some of the dogmaticians have made the mutual recognition of the saints a part of the bliss of heaven, while others have disregarded this feature. Gerhard and Hutter also discuss the question whether the blessed will behold the damned. The former says: “Beati videbunt suos notos et cognitos inter damnatos quotienscumque voluerint, sed absque ullo commiserationis affectu.” The will of the blessed will have become perfectly conformed to the will of God, so that they adore also the glory and majesty of the divine justice in viewing the torments of the damned.

Prayer: O Christ, our Redeemer, fulfill upon us Thy promise of life eternal. Complete Thy work in us. Restore Thy Church to union with Thee. Bless our bodies and souls with Thy peace and joy everlasting, Amen.