Heralding the Gospel: The Evangelical Function of the Church Steeple

The Golden Steeple of St. John Lutheran Church (LCMS), Hermansfort, WI. Drawing all eyes to the Cross of Christ.

 

The Steeple and the Cross
The church steeple is that part of the Romanesque and Gothic church architectures which include the tower – often housing bells for announcing Liturgical Hours, the Divine Service, and various other aspects of church life to the countryside – atop of which was often mounted the spire. In congregations not suffering from the poison of iconoclasm, the spire would support a large Cross, visible from the ground and all over the countryside. Here is a technical description from one of my favorite authors, Dr. P.E. Kretzmann:

Église Saint-Paul de Strasbourg Originally, a Prussian military church, built during their last occupation of France in 1897.

A tower should never be omitted in building a Lutheran church. And if this is crowned with a spire, the symbolism of which has always been recognized, the effect will be all the greater. There is a certain factor of incompleteness about a mere tower, even if surmounted by slender turrets, which somehow renders it incongruous. The battlemented towers of many churches with Norman characteristics remind one more strongly of a castle or of a fortress than of a church. A graceful spire rising from a strongly-built tower is always a pleasing, and often an inspiring sight. The tower will, of course, be an integral part of the church, although it will not be built flush with the facade, but stand out one-fourth to one-half its width. "The tower, as a sign and summons, stands properly over the chief entrance, at the west..." (Mothes, quoted in Horn, 112). ...In larger churches, two towers of equal height and identical construction are erected at the two western corners. If the work is properly done, the effect is most imposing. The cost, however, is an item which is apt to discourage many congregations, for towers and spires are very expensive. The entire tower must be buttressed very firmly, since in most cases it is intended to include the belfry and must bear the weight of the bells as well as that of the spire. The careful anchoring of the spire in the walls of the tower is an essential point, since the stress to which it is exposed, even in a mild wind, is one whose force is generally underestimated. The belfry of the tower, if it is to serve the purpose well, should be situated above the roof, in order that the sound of the pealing bell or bells may travel without hindrance in every direction. It is hardly necessary to add that the architecture of the tower must harmonize perfectly with that of the rest of the building. It will usually be a strong test of the architect's ability to plan the tower in such a way as to give it the appearance of an integral part of the church and also preserve its solidity and beauty.

The Cross of Christ and the Harvest of Souls
Who is it that Christ has sent us to harvest? Answer: those whom the Holy Spirit has prepared for harvest.

Behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white already to harvest. And he that reapeth receiveth wages, and gathereth fruit unto life eternal: that both he that soweth and he that reapeth may rejoice together. And herein is that saying true,

One soweth, and another reapeth
.
I sent you to reap that whereon ye bestowed no labour; other men laboured, and ye are entered into their labours (Jn. 4:35b-38).

Those who have laboured before us, making public use of God’s Word to communicate the Gospel’s message to “gather fruit unto life eternal,” have employed the Means through which the Holy Spirit has also begun the work of drawing the unregenerate unto Himself and into fellowship with other Christians in the Body of Christ – that is, in the Church. “He that reapeth” is merely “entering into the labours” of many Christians who have gone before, some whose use of Law & Gospel has served to plant, others whose use of Scripture has served to tend budding faith, until the soul has been fully prepared by the Holy Spirit for harvest. This does not mean that some go planting, some go tending, and some go harvesting. All go harvesting, but such use of the Means of Grace serves to plant and tend as well.

St. John Lutheran Church (WELS) Popple Creek, WI Still heralding the Cross of Christ.

The Cross is the single perfect heraldic icon for the purpose of evangelism, for in the Cross is simultaneously the message of the Law – symbolizing the punishment of death and separation from God that we deserve on account of our sin – and the message of the Gospel – symbolizing Christ’s innocent suffering and death on our behalf and on behalf of all sinners. Mounted high atop the steeple spire for every eye to see, and for every soul to consider, such a location is the perfect place from which to herald the cross of Christ. Mounted upon the highest point in the local landscape, the Cross is seen to cover all. Just as the life and work of Jesus Christ was done on behalf of all, the Cross and its full meaning is for all. The repentant sinner, including the soul ready for harvest, is drawn to the Cross, and entrance to the Church of Christ. Those who come to the cross, have been compelled to do so, drawn to it by the work of the Holy Spirit who has worked in them by Means of the Message of Good News. They are His work, through the simple message of Law & Gospel. Over the years, the steeple and Cross has fallen out of favour, ridiculed for being passe, and it seems to me that the decline of Christianity in America has accompanied these opinions. Perhaps truly evangelical churches should once again consider returning the Cross of Christ to a place of prominence in America’s landscape? Using the building as a herald of the Gospel is good evangelical stewardship.



“Programs” in Place of the Cross: Harvesting Green Tomatoes?
Yet, these days, many people fret that the simple heraldic preaching of the Cross fails to produce a harvest of souls, fails to adequately “build the Church,” in their opinion. Assuming faithful and rightly divided preaching of the pure Word, why would this be the case? The answer has already been provided above, but is worth repeating: the souls to whom the message is preached in these cases are simply not ready for harvest. We are equipped with tools of harvest, to reap that which has been prepared by the working of the Holy Spirit. But, if such preaching fails to reap, then, is this preaching in vain? Hardly! Similar to Christ, in the words of John 3, above, Paul explains in his first letter to the Corinthians:

Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed, even as the Lord gave to every man? I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase. So then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase. Now he that planteth and he that watereth are one: and every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labour. For we are labourers together with God: ye are God’s husbandry, ye are God’s building. According to the grace of God which is given unto me, as a wise masterbuilder, I have laid the foundation, and another buildeth thereon. But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon (1 Co. 3:5-10).

Paul is here speaking to the congregation of building the Church. Planting in this reference can be considered roughly equivalent to both sowing and reaping in the analogy used by Jesus in John 3, above. Watering, in Paul’s use refers to keeping the fruit after the harvest Christ spoke of in His analogy. One man plants, another waters, and God uses this labour to grant the increase. Jesus indicates likewise: one man sows, another reaps. The one who realizes numeric increase has no basis for pointing to something he has done – he has entered into the labour of many labourers who have preceded him, and together they rejoice in God’s work of increasing his Church, Who uses such labour merely as an instrument of the Means of Grace, through which God works to give, and keep, increase. The tools for planting and watering in the example of Paul are the same as they are for sowing and reaping in the analogy used by Jesus: faithful and rightly divided preaching of the pure Word.

The dual spires of the Cathedral in Cologne rise to 515 feet.

In the reference just cited, however, it is interesting to note that Paul transitions from the picture of the evangelist as gardener, to the evangelist as builder. Emphasizing in the first picture that those who come to faith and stay in faith are God’s work not man’s, he shifts in the second picture to give dire warning: how the evangelist and preacher participates in the work of God is no trivial matter. Paul continues:

For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid in Jesus Christ. Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; Every man’s work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is. (1 Co. 3:11-13)

When Christians get impatient with the Holy Spirit, lose trust in the Means of Grace, and begin to doubt the efficacy of the Word, they resort to laying a foundation other than that which is laid in the simple preaching of the Cross, other than the foundation laid in Jesus Christ. In their impatience for the Lord to prepare His harvest, and “grant them their wages,” they exclaim:

– Merely preaching the pure Word does not work!
– Merely telling the message of Law & Gospel to our neighbors does not work!
– Articulating and holding dogmatically to true Scripture teaching does not work!
– Maintaining an orderly, reverent, christocentric liturgy which shows forth the Marks of the Church and elevates the Means of Grace, doesn’t work!
– We must do something different!
– We must do something more!
– We must do something more exciting!
– We must do something more meaningful!
– We must do something more real, more relevant, and more relational!

And so these impetuous Christians busy themselves with laying a foundation other than Jesus Christ, as He is found in the faithful preaching of the pure Word in Law and Gospel. They really have no choice: those not prepared by the Holy Spirit for harvest will not be harvested by these reaper’s tools. To harvest souls not yet prepared for harvest, the reaper must use tools not given him by God for this purpose. He must use his own tools. He must lay a foundation other than Jesus Christ, alone. In doing so, he picks fruit otherwise not intended for harvest. He’s intent upon plucking Green Tomatoes. These unripened fruit don’t care about the preaching of the Cross or pure doctrine, nor would they respond to it; they respond to programs for the family and children. They are not drawn as a matter of conscience, by the Holy Spirit’s working, to the Church of Christ; they are drawn by titullating Sunday morning entertainment. The foundation laid by such approaches makes use of man’s tools: popular and common devices used by commercial enterprise to stimulate consumer patronage. But the structure built on this foundation does not look like the Church.


The Place of the Cross in Western Society
In a recent lecture I attended, the Rev. Dr. Frederic Baue (LCMS) commented rather poignantly (and I summarize from memory):

The monuments erected by man are an indication of his culture’s priorities.

Lecturing from aspects of his book¹, The Spiritual Society: What Lurks Beyond Postmodernism?, he was drawing from the recently “rediscovered” writings of Russian-American sociologist Pitirim Sorokin and highlighting the nature of cultural transition as cultures oscillate from Ideational to Sensate to Ideational modalities. According to Sorokin, transitional periods between these modalities are marked by cultural upheaval of various sorts. For example, the First Advent of Christ occurred deep in the sensate Roman Era. As happens in Sensate cultures, over time, they become more sensate as they progress toward their demise, making way for Ideational change. With the fall of Rome, the Roman Era gave way to the Mediaeval Era – the most previous era of Ideational modality, an era dominated by Christian thought. Following this, the Renaissance – a “rebirth” of ancient cultural priorities – was a transitional period back to an era of Sensate modality, an era known as the Modern Era. ²

The Rise and Fall of Modernism
Christian influence from the previous era dominating this transition and leaving the distinct mark of Christian thought upon the foundations of Modernism, the Visible church largely oversaw and was an influential participant and contributor to this cultural change; and in nearly every quarter her theology followed suit – with one peculiar exception: the Lutheran Reformation in Germany. While the Roman Church was the primary sponsor of the Renaissance transition, and the forward looking Swiss Reformation under Zwingli, Calvin, Beza and others was responsible for developing distinctly Modern theological systems, the Lutheran Church looked back. The Lutheran Church preserved the teaching of the apostles, which teaching preceded and prepared for the rise of the Mediaeval Era. Resting in conscience, standing on Confession, embracing the mysteries of the Sacraments, the hypostatic union of natures in Christ, and the Holy Spirit’s work through the Means of Grace, the Lutheran Church, in her theology, remained distinctly Mediaeval, distinctly “Ideational,” and preserved this character over following generations, though in ever diminishing influence as the withering onslaught of heterodoxy and pragmatic political machinations worked against her. By the time of the Prussian Union and Evangelical mergers of the early 19^th Century, true Confessional Lutheranism, and the mediaeval theological perspectives she preserved, had nearly been extinguished.

The Strasbourg Cathedral was the tallest structure in the world, from 1647-1874, during which time Strasbourg was also at the center of European commerce. Lutheran during the Reformation, it see-sawed over the centuries, between Roman and Lutheran control, as the Alsace was exchanged by successive military conquest between France and Germany.

The late 19^th Century, however marked the beginning of a transition to a New Ideational Era – and the beginning of the end of Modernism. We see this in the dramatic changes that occurred in the arts, and in political ideology beginning at about this time. We see this in the political and social upheaval that resulted and intensified into the 20^th Century, and in the increasing diffusion of academic focus through this time. The Holocost, while horrifying solely for the sake of the peoples involved, was particularly galvanizing for a larger reason, also: it permanently extinguished any optimism for Modernism, and marked the end of the Modern Era.

We see the result of this upheaval in greater Christianity today. As Christian perspectives based on Modernistic, “sensate-oriented” cultural modalities slink into irrelevancy, we witness among them the marks of flailing confusion. Modern Evangelicalism is one example. The pragmatic clarion call of the pop-church Evangelical, “We must be Real, Relevant, and Relational,” is incoherent nonsense when placed next to the clear teachings of Scripture, and is itself a recipe for failure. And fail it has. Barna Research – a Christian research firm formerly dedicated to the theories of the Church Growth Movement (CGM), whose mission it was to provide Evangelicals with marketing data and analysis to assist congregations in their implementation of CGM – declared in 2005, after a string of very shrill warnings regarding the demise of the American Church over previous years, that the theories of the Church Growth Movement are a statistical failure. Having invested over $500 billion dollars implementing the methods of CGM over the course of 30 years, no evidence of growth was discernible in American Christianity. None. Denominational shift is all that can be observed or attributed to these methods. In an effort to understand and pragmatically react to cultural change, Modern Christians, still stuck in the previous cultural era, reveal that they are oblivious to the real and monumental changes that have occurred in the past century, and are continuing to occur right now.


Confessional Lutheranism, Liturgical Expression, and the Rise of the New Cultural Era
We see the beginning of the end of Modernism in the late 19^th Century in two other respects. One is the collection and emergence of organized efforts among Christian remnants of the previous Ideational Era – that is, the return of a forceful and learned articulation of Confessional Lutheranism. The Confessional and Liturgical movements we observe today, which, more and more, we Christians are attaching ourselves to, didn’t just begin a few years ago. They are an extension of what was begun by the Henkel’s (Tennessee Synod), Walther’s (Lutheran Church Missouri Synod), Preuses (Norwegian Synod), Krauth’s (General Council), Bading’s and Hoenecke’s (Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod) and the Pieper’s (WELS & LCMS) of the 19^th and early 20^th Centuries. In point of fact, “relevant” Christianity in our new Ideational cultural era will be informed by and take its direction from the perspectives of the previous such era, of Mediaeval Christianity, while Modernist systems, outside of the most resilient and tenacious of the Reformed confessions, will mostly just go away. Adopting and incorporating their increasingly irrelevant perspectives into Lutheran teaching and practice is, more than it ever was before, theological suicide.

Cultural Change marked in the Monuments of Man
A second respect in which we can see the beginning of the end of Modernism, is revealed in the increasingly “sensate” nature of the most prominent monuments of Modernism. From the late Mediaeval Era forward until the beginning of the close of the Modern Era, the largest, tallest and most impressive structures built by man were monuments to God: Christian Churches, with steeples reaching as high as 525 ft, atop of which were mounted the Cross of Christ, as a herald of Law & Gospel to the entire countryside, and an announcement that the Word of Peace and Reconciliation with God could be received, along with all of its eternal benefits, in His Church.

But what happened in the late 19^th Century? The most impressive of man’s monuments, far from being reserved for the special honor of God, were instead directed to man himself, boasting of his achievements, and proclaiming that his priorities were no longer his faith in God and his acknowledgment of gratitude toward God, but of accumulating wealth and honor for himself. From 1311 to 1884 AD, the tallest, most adorned, and most impressive structures in the Western world were churches. In 1884, the Washington Monument became the tallest structure, and then in 1889 the Eiffel Tower was built to kick-off the World’s Fair in Paris, completely dwarfing all other structures in the Western world. From 1930 onward, the worlds tallest and most impressive structures have been office buildings – monuments of man to the priority of commercial enterprise and the accumulation of wealth and power³. Accompanying the dramatic decline of Modernism in the 20^th Century, we see that man’s priorities became dramatically more “sensate.”

Today, throwback modernistic Christians consider the church steeple to be passe, impractical, and more expense than it is worth -- and then boast of their stewardship. Yet these same Christians will line up to throw away $500 billion dollars over thirty years on worthless entertainments and other human inventions, to build anthropocentric organizations on the foundation of hedonism. They call it “church” but what is it really? Emptied of Scripture teaching, shunting aside the Marks of the Church, rejecting the straightforward preaching of Law & Gospel and reliance on the Means of Grace, removing Christ from His central position and replacing him with the priorities of man, these organizations look and sound nothing like “the Church.” Their work is being tried, and revealed for what sort it is: after a generation of trying to pluck Green Tomatoes using tools contrived by man, and succeeding mostly in just robbing "harvest fruit" from other church bodies, while little by little depriving it of preservative preaching of Law & Gospel, Christians find they have indigestion. Thus, these church-like organizations are now in dramatic decline -- precipitous decline -- as spoiled fruit oozes out from the organizational structures they have built.

And yet the old stone church buildings remain. Even though some are emptied of people, and others are emptied of sound teaching, these monuments to God continue to herald the Cross of Christ, to focus the eyes of all on Him and His Gospel message, and to draw people to Christ and His Church. The people may be mute, but the stones still conspicuously cry out, publicly assigning worth to God.

A 19th Century church of Gothic Revival4 architecture, St. Nikolai Kirche in Hamburg, Germany was destroyed in the bombings of WWII. Yet, the steeple remains, elevating the Cross of Christ 483 feet above the landscape.

Built on the Rock the Church doth stand,
Even when steeples are falling.
Crumbled have spires in every land,
Bells still are chiming and calling
Calling the old and young to rest,
But above all the soul distressed
Longing for rest everlasting.

Grant then, O God, wher’er men roam,
That, when the church bells are ringing
Many in Jesus’ faith may come
Where He His message is bringing
“I know mine own, mine own know me,
Ye, not the world, my face shall see:
My peace I leave with you, Amen”

Built on the Rock, v1&7
TLH 467, ELH 211, CW 529




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Endnotes:

1. This book is necessary reading for any Christian who would be a student of culture.
   
2. This is, of course, Sociological theory, which, in the end, probably holds about as much water as Psychological theories. There are so many different theories because of the difficulty in testing hypothesis, each theory one is found wanting by observation. Nevertheless, the recent “rediscovery of Sorokin’s writings has generated much interest in his ideas, and given a boost to Social Dynamic theories, which for the most part have been based on demographic rather than cultural/ideological criteria. He is considered a “giant” of 20^th Century sociological research.
   
3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World's_tallest_structures#History_of_record_holders_in_each_CTBUH_category
   
4. All of the structures featured on this page were constructed either in the late Mediaeval Era, or are structures built in the late 19^th Century during the later Gothic Revival, coinciding with “Ideational” influences as they are thought to have been showing their influence.
   

 

“Synod Sunday” in the WELS: Mission Closings, Membership Declines, and How the Gospel can Help

The Gospel used as Law to produce guilt and motivate righteous works. "Jesus has done this for you, now you must do that for Him!"

 

I just arrived home from a truly mournful Sunday morning. If it weren’t for the Liturgy, there would have been no spiritual profit in the exercise, at all. Once a year in the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran synod (WELS), we endure what is called “Walking Together” or “Synod” Sunday – a day which should be one of celebrating our mutual Confession and the work we do together in the context of that Confession (i.e., the Lutheran Confessions as expressed in the Book of Concord, for those Lutherans under the mistaken impression that we merely confess the Bible, alongside innumerable non-confessional non-denominational Christians), but which has become a day of marketing the Synod to its members and of using Law to coerce financial contributions and using the anxiety it creates to motivate “outreach activities,” in order to “grow the Synod.” I’m sure that many church bodies in America have much the same sort of “day” which they inflict upon their own members and visitors. In our case, the Office of Church Growth, at Synod headquarters, distributed prayers, sermon outlines, and videos, to accompany the mandate of “Synod Sunday.” It was Church Growth schlock from start to finish.

The unsavory fact is, my own good and faithful pastor – a fine preacher and Confessional fellow – somehow got suckered into delivering this “Synod Sunday” Church Growth sermon, which prepared the congregation for a viewing of the accompanying post-service “Synod Sunday” video, replete with the heart rending boo-hoo’ing of missionaries in New York who are facing an uncertain future in their Vocation. I’m sure that hundreds of other fine pastors in our Synod were duped into preaching the same thing.

The Message of the Law: Are you doing everything to reach the lost?
That was the question which served as the climax of today’s “Synod Sunday” sermon. It was accompanied with a full battery statistics lamenting a decrease in giving, the loss of missions due to lack of funding, and the decrease in Synod membership supposedly as a consequence of bankrupt and closing missions. A Law imperative, hardly Gospel, it was used as the basis for suggesting that the deep dark sinner-in-the-pew reexamine how much he gives, whether his budget priorities maximize the ability of the congregation to reach out with the Gospel, and whether he himself “at all times and in every situation” is maximizing opportunities to share the Gospel. The organization is suffering uncertainty, and the sinner in the pew, of course, is the culprit – the unfailing failure who, because he can’t do “everything” as he should, is the cause of organizational distress.

Everything? Really?
Everything? Let’s examine the impossibility of even considering this question. It’s simple.

1. Hell will be populated. Vastly populated. We know this because the Bible is clear on this fact: The LORD is known by the judgment which He executeth: the wicked is snared in the work of his hands... The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God. (Ps. 9:16-17; cf. Re. 20:12-15 and elsewhere). The wicked, on account of their work, shall be cast into hell. “Everything” a person can think to do will not change this fact, neither for himself, nor for others. As a result, the Christian burdened with doing “everything” has no way of measuring if “everything” has been done in any given case to bring the lost to faith in the promises of Christ, or if “something more” will keep the lost out of hell.
   
   Moreover, no individual, no congregation, is guaranteed a harvest of any measurable sort. How would anyone know if “everything” has been done or not? No one can know, since unbelief abounds, since those in unbelief are still under sin (Ro. 1:18-25, 28-32; 3:9-10; Ga. 3:22), and since we know that there are those still in unbelief who suffer death and are lost for eternity as a result. If the task is ours, we can only conclude that we have not done “everything.” The question can only be answered in the negative. Thus, directing the thoughts of an individual to the question of whether he has done “everything” is not a question asked to provoke anything other than guilt – it makes the fate of the lost the fault of the imperfect evangelist, rather than the unbeliever’s own obstinacy, and places the impossible task of the Holy Spirit on the shoulders of the weak Christian, who is neither equipped nor expected to carry out His work.


2. Predestination is a reality. That’s right, we Lutherans believe in predestination (Ep. 1:3-14; Ro. 8:28-30). No one will go to hell, who, if only the guilt-laden Lutheran could have “done a little more” (or done “everything,” for that matter), would have otherwise gone to heaven. Everyone who is supposed to come to faith, and stay in faith, will come to faith – the Holy Spirit will see to it. Under the doctrine of Predestination, there is no cause for guilt whatsoever, if the individual has not done “everything” (whatever that is) to save the lost. None. After all, the Lutheran does not save the lost. The Holy Spirit does, through, and only through, the Lutheran's faithful use of the Means of Grace. It is impossible for the Lutheran to do “everything,” even to do anything, that contributes to his own salvation or the salvation of others. What’s more, the Holy Spirit does everything, and will do everything necessary to call those whom He foreknew into faith and to life everlasting.
   
   Arminians and others who reject the teaching of Divine Monergism, do not believe in the doctrine of Predestination. They object to the teaching of Total Depravity and require the ascent of man’s will to God’s gracious offer of forgiveness, life, and salvation through faith. Believers among them have the Gospel, and having it, the burden is theirs to share it. Under such teaching, the Gospel is shaped into a hammer, to beat the poor Christian into the obligation of sharing the Gospel. Love, no doubt, is part of this effort, but anxiety over the lost and guilt associated with the burden of “doing everything” to save them accompanies this love. By allowing themselves to fall under the influence of non-monergistic influences, our own Office of Church Growth seems intent upon ladling the same sort of guilt and anxiety on the members of our Synod, to work together, not for the truth, not really for the sake of the Gospel, but ultimately for the health of the organization.

“Walking Together” is principally not about sharing the Gospel, together, anyway
It is principally about the task of keeping the Gospel pure, together. The unfortunate thing about the entire tragedy of the “Synod Sunday” Church Growth program this morning is that only a minor aspect of one word in the phrase “Walking Together” was emphasized – the result of having the pure Word, of working to keep the Word pure despite the onslaught of heterodoxy that surrounds us, of being under the teaching of the pure Word, of benefiting from the Holy Spirit’s work through the pure word, such that individuals are motivated, not by anxiety, fear and guilt, but by Joy and Gratitude for what is their’s in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, to share the Gospel. What was emphasized today was only the final result of "walking" in “togetherness”: sharing the Gospel. Being a horribly incomplete picture of “Walking Together,” it was grossly out of balance with what “Walking Together” really encompasses. Moreover, it was a calculated imbalance to coerce action in support of the Synod as an organization.

I repeat: regarding our supposed “Togetherness,” there was no mention of our Confessions, of our confessional Unity, of having pure doctrine nor of keeping it pure; there was no distinction given to our “togetherness” with respect to the “otherness” of the heterodox: and regarding our “walking” within this “togetherness,” again, there was no mention of keeping the word pure, no attention given to the preaching of this Word among our own, little to no mention of the role and work of the Holy Spirit through such use of the Means of Grace, no mention given to the consequent working of the Holy Spirit in the individual Christian, and no mention given to the internal motivation that the Gospel promises supply, according to the gifts one has been given. Only the result of all this was dwelt upon: sharing the Gospel. Not only was the entire “Synod Sunday” Church Growth program imbalanced and inadequate in its explanation of “Walking Together,” it was misleading and false, it twisted Gospel Joy into an obligation of Law, and laid the burden of this Law, without Gospel remedy, on the shoulders of the poor Christian in the pew.

Church Workers, and Uncertainty in One’s Vocation
In his commentary on the Book of Genesis, Luther states regarding the distinction of Vocations:

Because they persecute the Word, they are the enemies of faith. Shun them, and follow in the footsteps of the saintly men, who did not shrink from being associated with ordinary people and had no regard for their own ease but submitted to the common hardships of this life and had wives and families whom they supported by their diligence and labor, just as all sensible heads of households are commonly wont to do, even among the heathen.

“But are these ordinary works?” you will ask. Nevertheless, they are commended by Holy Scripture, which bears witness that man was created for the duties of the household and of the state. Hence these ordinary works are God’s order. What more glorious commendation are you asking for, or what clearer testimony? Hence when a maid milks the cows or a hired man hoes the field – provided that they are believers, namely, that they conclude that this kind of life is pleasing to God and was instituted by God – they serve God more than all the monks and nuns, who cannot be sure about their kind of life. Therefore set these accounts against the traditions and canons of men; for here there is the testimony of the Holy Spirit, who says of His saints that they lived in the faith, the Word, and the confession but were like the rest of men in all other respects. Thus Paul says to the heathen (cf. Acts 14:15): “We are men just like you”; that is, we are similarly affected. We grieve when there is trouble, and we rejoice if our affairs prosper in accordance with our way of thinking.

I impress these facts frequently and gladly, and I know that this is not done without fruit. Evidently this false notion is so deeply fixed in the hearts of all men that we admire only what is rare, strange, and unnatural. Let us rather remain pupils of the Holy Spirit and of Scripture, and let us imitate the lives and the deeds of those whom Scripture praises and presents as examples. Let us not bother about the fact that in accordance with a special call Abraham was a warrior and killed four kings. He did this by a special command. When God wants you to do something of that sort, he will give you a command to that effect, not indeed from heaven through angels but through the constituted authority. If this does not happen, refrain from extraordinary deeds, and keep in mind Abraham in his calling as head of the household. Even if, as the papists maintain, you do works of the laity, these are nevertheless truly spiritual, because of faith and the Word. (LW Vol. 3, pg. 321)

As we are all Priests in the Order of the Universal Priesthood of all Believers, the Vocation of the missionary is no more spiritual or necessary than that of the “layman.” In point of fact, Luther is said to have abolished the laity. All Christians are Priests, some serving in one capacity, others in another capacity, many in more than one capacity. Those with Divine Call are those chosen by God, through the congregation, to a particular Vocation on behalf of the Church.

Everything in this earth is transitory. Vocation is never secure. Those of us in the real world deal with this fact every day. Even union workers are getting a good taste of it these days. That we look for success “in accordance with our way of thinking” is natural, but it is a weakness of our limitations. It is further weakness to refuse to admit “failure” as it occurs “in accordance with our way of thinking.” Yet, in temporal matters, it is considered wise to recognize the end of a Vocation as it draws near – an orderly withdrawal from such tasks often eliminates unnecessary cost and disruption, and serves to position one for alternate work most efficiently. When the door is shut to us in our Vocation, it is time to move on. And it is shut for many causes. Sometimes it is financial. Sometimes it is a physical or geographical limitation. Sometimes we succumb to efforts of a competitor. Sometimes it is the result of a former friend’s betrayal. Sometimes we see it coming, other times we do not. That’s life.

In spiritual matters, however, this is not the case. The Holy Spirit never stops working – Providentially, to create situations where the Gospel message will be communicated, and Supernaturally through the Gospel message when it is communicated – and He will not leave His work undone. All those who are to come to faith, and remain in faith, will do so. No one will be left out. Though our work in a given Vocation may come to an end, the Holy Spirit’s work will continue. It is the Christian's privilege to be a part of His ongoing work, which he gladly enjoins apart from any command to do so, solely for the sake of Christ and His Gospel.

For the Christian motivated by what Christ has done for him, however, not by fear of eternal doom (whether his own or someone else’s) or anxiety wrought from unfavorable statistics, there will always be something to do, always be an opportunity to share the Gospel of Christ with others – not of necessity, but of love. We serve others for the sake of the Gospel out of love for Christ, and for no other reason. The missionaries in New York featured in todays “Synod Sunday” video may well find themselves without their current Vocation in the near future. That’s too bad, as I’m sure they love what they do there, but that ministry is not necessary in the sense that someone will be lost without their effort. The Holy Spirit will seek and find those who are lost, and He will do so through Christians who are enabled, motivated and Called to do so. No guilt should be laid on an entire body of Christians because some missionaries are no longer able to do what they like to do, as if apart from that effort we are all guilty of someone else’s eternal damnation. Those who will suffer for eternity in such a way are under sin, they are themselves guilty of their own sin, and they will have only themselves to blame when they stand before the Righteous Judge on the Last Day. Our job is not to fret about this, but to hold tenaciously to the precious gift of faith which has been given to us. Having it, we can’t help but share it.

 

 

Una Sancta and the Liturgy

The True Visible church represents the Una Sancta

 

Returning again to JK’s comment, waaaay back in December (an off-topic comment he offered in response to my blog post, Global Warming: What is it all about?), he writes concerning use of the liturgy:

The liturgical church is still a man made entity. ...The caveat for me is when people cling to the liturgical church and say that this is the only way. Then this ceases to be worship and falls into the category of methods.

True enough – the historic liturgy that Lutherans follow, if it is “a way of doing something,” is also a “method.” The term “method” applied to CGM, however, has nothing to do with whether it is merely “a way of doing something,” but is a shorthand reference to “a way” which, at it’s root, (a) either replaces or is thought to augment the Holy Spirit’s work through the Means of Grace, (b) subverts the christocentric nature of the Divine Service in favor of anthropocentric priorities, (c) thoughtlessly corrupts the Marks of the Church, and (d) abrogates the practice of a distinctly Lutheran confession, replacing it with popular ecumenical expressions. Hence, in the discussion against CGM, the term “method” is not used in distinction to “no method,” as if methods are not allowed, but is used to highlight it’s negative impact on the Means of Grace, the Marks of the Church, the centrality of Christ in our corporate worship, and our Confessional stand against errorists. In point of fact, “methods” of some sort – where I must be careful to point out that the term method is used here in its broadest sense, as in “a way of doing something” – are a requirement of congregational worship: For God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as in all the churches of the saints... Let all things be done decently and in order. (1 Co. 14:26-40). The “ways” which we agree to use, however, are not arbitrary, the order called for encompasses far more than just guiding a worshiper through a process, as if any old process will do. The Divine Service is the chief expression of the Church regarding who she is and what she does. This expression is Public in every respect, directed toward and occurring in the presence of God and before man. Rather than arbitrary anthropocentric “methods,” it is critical that the rites we choose to carry us through the Divine Service properly represent, teach and confess what the Church is, Her relationship with Christ and Her function in this world.

So why is it that “the way” Lutherans worship is the way it is? Why is it Historical? Why is it Liturgical? My brief answer: Chiefly Public Confession (which also teaches and represents). What follows is my long answer.

Practice Teaches, Practice Confesses: The Lutheran Confessions on the Liturgy
This is a subsection title of a post I published back in July 2009, Lutheran Worship and the Confessions: Adiaphora Bounded (Part 2). This series on Confessional worship practices started with Part 1 and culminated in a third part entitled Confessional Anthology: Why is the Lutheran Church a Liturgical Church?, which led off with a link to a very helpful and similarly titled essay by Rev. David Jay Weber (ELS): Why is the Lutheran Church a Liturgical Church? -- A Confessional Anthology.

In the subsection of Part 2, which I titled Practice Teaches, Practice Confesses, I emphasized the confessional nature of Lutheran worship practice, stating as follows:

In the quotations already cited, the idea that Practice teaches is interwoven into the substance of our Confession regarding Church practice: “that the common people might receive a sort of training” (AP XV [20]); “the children sing Psalms in order that they may learn,” and “the people also sing so that they may either learn or pray” (AP XV [40]). In addition, the Lutheran Confessions point our adversaries to our Practice as proof of our Confession, as stated above: “From this condition of the churches it may be determined that we earnestly keep Church discipline, godly ceremonies, and good Church customs” (AP XV [44]). But there is more.

In AC XXIV, the Confessions state directly, “For ceremonies are needed for this reason alone, that the uneducated be taught what they need to know about Christ” (3). This repeats the afore mentioned, that Practice teaches. Insofar as it teaches, it is not a matter of indifference – we are not free to teach falsely through Practice, and when we do teach, we are bound to make every effort to teach the whole counsel of God. The Historic Liturgy described in the series, Explanation of the Common Service, is an example of this.

Moreover, from this same reference in the Confessions, we see that Practice confesses. Leading to the above statement in par. 3, AC XXIV states, “Our churches are falsely accused of abolishing the Mass. The Mass is held among us and celebrated with the highest reverence. Nearly all the usual ceremonies are also preserved...” (1,2). From this reference we learn two things: (1) in the face of criticism, we not only assert our Confession, i.e., “Falsely are we accused...,” but (2) we point to our Practice as proof of our Confession, i.e., “The Mass is held... [and] nearly all the usual ceremonies are preserved.” Additionally, (3) we learn that inferring Confession from observance of Practice is legitimate, and that those whose Practice is confusing or offensive with respect to their Confession owe an explanation. But there is yet more...

The reader can satisfy his curiosity by examining the rest of that blog post for himself. One critical point to understand with respect to our Confession regarding the Church and our relationship to it, is that the Reformers were accused by the Romans of being outside the One True Church, of being sectarian. To fully quote AC XXIV referenced in the second paragraph in the above quote,

[1] Falsely are our churches accused of abolishing the Mass; for the Mass is retained among [2] us, and celebrated with the highest reverence. Nearly all the usual ceremonies are also preserved, save that the parts sung in Latin are interspersed here and there with German hymns, which have been added [3] to teach the people. For ceremonies are needed to this end alone that the unlearned [4] be taught [what they need to know of Christ]. And not only has Paul commanded to use in the church a language understood by the people 1 Co. 14:2-9, but it has also been so ordained by man's law.

it needs to be understood that by accusing the Reformers of abolishing the Mass, the Romans were principally accusing them of rejecting their catholicity. This is made abundantly clear in the Apology, where in defense of this article, Melancthon writes:

The fact that we hold only Public or Common Mass [at which the people also commune, not Private Mass] is no offense against the Church catholic... (6)

Moreover, it needs to be understood, contrary to what some modern commentators seem to think, that by the term Mass, the Reformers were not referring merely to the consecration and distribution of the eucharistic elements, i.e. the Eucharistic rite itself, but to the Sacrament together with the preaching of the Word and their supporting ritual apparatus. According to the Reformers, restricting use of the term Mass to the ceremony of the Lord’s Supper (as the Roman’s did) went hand-in-hand with restricting it to the sacrificial act of the celebrant, the benefit of which was derived merely from the act itself, opus operatum; but Mass properly understood, they insisted, is the sacramental benefit of the Lord’s Supper, the same benefit as the Absolution and the preaching of the Word, etc. – in other words, that of the service of God to Man by the ministrations of the Minister, through the Means of Grace, on account of which the ceremonies were established. The idea that the Mass was more than just the Supper was fixed by Luther by 1523, with the issuance of his first new liturgy, An Order of Mass and Communion for the Church at Wittenburg, in which he states, “...properly speaking, the mass consists in using the Gospel and communing at the table of the Lord” (LW 53:25). By 1526, the term Mass was used synonymously with the Divine Service, and Luther uses the two terms interchangeably in the preface and body of his Deutsche Messe (LW 53:49ff).

That these definitions are operative aspects of our Public Confession is represented clearly in article XXIV of the Apology:

Lord’s Supper is not ritual sacrifice, and cannot be separated from the preaching of the Gospel
[34] Another passage also is cited from Malachi 3:3: And He shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the Lord an offering of righteousness. This passage clearly requires the sacrifices of the righteous, and hence does not favor the opinion concerning the opus operatum. But the sacrifices of the sons of Levi, i.e., of those teaching in the New Testament, are the preaching of the Gospel and the good fruits of preaching, as Paul says, Ro. 15:16: Ministering the Gospel of God, that the offering up of the Gentiles might be acceptable, being sanctified by the Holy Ghost, i.e., that, the Gentiles might be offerings acceptable to God by faith, etc. For in the Law the slaying of victims signified both the death of Christ and the preaching of the Gospel, by which this oldness of flesh should be mortified, and the new and eternal life be begun in us.

But the adversaries everywhere perversely apply the name sacrifice to the ceremony alone. They omit the preaching of the Gospel, faith, prayer, and similar things, although the ceremony has been established on account of these, and the New Testament ought to have sacrifices of the heart, and not ceremonials for sin that are to be performed after the manner of the Levitical priesthood.

Entire Mass understood as Lord’s Supper together with preaching and ceremony
[35] They cite also the daily sacrifice (cf. Ex. 29:38f.; Dan. 8:11f.; 12:11), that, just as in the Law there was a daily sacrifice so the Mass ought to be a daily sacrifice of the New Testament. The adversaries have managed well if we permit ourselves to be overcome by allegories. It is evident, however, that allegories do not produce firm proofs [that in matters so highly important before God we must have a sure and clear word of God, and not introduce by force obscure and foreign passages; such uncertain explanations do not stand the test of God's judgment]. Although we indeed readily suffer the Mass to be understood as a daily sacrifice, provided that the entire Mass be understood, i.e., the ceremony with the preaching of the Gospel, faith, invocation, and thanksgiving. For these joined together are a daily sacrifice of the New Testament, because the ceremony was instituted on account of these things; neither is it to be separated from these. Paul says accordingly, 1 Co. 11:26: As often as ye eat this bread and drink this cup, ye do show the Lord's death till He come. But it in no way follows from this Levitical type that a ceremony justifying ex opere operato is necessary, or ought to be applied on behalf of others, that it may merit for them the remission of sins.
(AP XXIV:34-35)

The terms Mass and Liturgy are synonymous, and refer to the entire Ministry of the Church in the Divine Service
[78] The adversaries also refer us to philology. From the names of the Mass they derive arguments which do not require a long discussion. For even though the Mass be called a sacrifice, it does not follow that it must confer grace ex opere operato, or, when applied on behalf of others, merit for them the remission of sins, etc. [79] Leitourgiva, they say, signifies a sacrifice, and the Greeks call the Mass, liturgy. Why do they here omit the old appellation synaxis, which shows that the Mass was formerly the communion of many? But let us speak of the word liturgy. [80] This word does not properly signify a sacrifice, but rather the public ministry, and agrees aptly with our belief, namely, that one minister who consecrates tenders the body and blood of the Lord to the rest of the people, just as one minister who preaches tenders the Gospel to the people, as Paul says, 1 Co. 4:1: Let a man so account of us as of the ministers of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God, i.e., of the Gospel and the Sacraments. And 2 Co. 5:20: We are ambassadors for Christ, as [81] though God did beseech you by us; we pray you in Christ's stead, Be ye reconciled to God. Thus the term leitourgia agrees aptly with the ministry... [82] Paul in 2 Co. 9:12 employs it for a collection. The taking of the collection not only supplies those things which are wanting to the saints, but also causes them to give more thanks abundantly to God, etc. And in Phil. 2:25 he calls Epaphroditus a ((greek)), one who ministered to my wants, [83] where assuredly a sacrificer cannot be understood. But there is no need of more testimonies, since examples are everywhere obvious to those reading the Greek writers, in whom leitourgia is employed for public civil burdens or ministries...

[87] But let us omit these trifles. For it is ridiculous that the adversaries should produce such trifling conjectures concerning a matter of such great importance. For although the Mass is called an offering, in what does the term favor the dreams concerning the opus operatum, and the application which, they imagine, merits for others the remission of sins? And it can be called an offering for the reason that prayers, thanksgivings, and the entire worship are there offered, as it is also called a eucharist. But neither ceremonies nor prayers profit ex opere operato, without faith...

[Here you can see what rude asses our adversaries are. They say that the term missa is derived from the term misbeach, which signifies an altar; hence we are to conclude that the Mass is a sacrifice; for sacrifices are offered on an altar. Again, the word liturgia, by which the Greeks call the Mass, is also to denote a sacrifice. This claim we shall briefly answer. All the world sees that from such reasons this heathenish and antichristian error does not follow necessarily, that the Mass benefits ex opere operato sine bono motu utentis. Therefore they are asses, because in such a highly important matter they bring forward such silly things. Nor do the asses know any grammar. For missa and liturgia do not mean sacrifice. Missa, in Hebrew, denotes a joint contribution. For this may have been a custom among Christians, that they brought meat and drink for the benefit of the poor to their assemblies. This custom was derived from the Jews, who had to bring such contributions on their festivals; these they called missa. Likewise, liturgia, in Greek, really denotes an office in which a person ministers to the congregation. This is well applied to our teaching, because with us the priest, as a common servant of those who wish to commune, ministers to them the holy Sacrament.

Some think that missa is not derived from the Hebrew, but signifies as much as remissio, the forgiveness of sin. For, the communion being ended, the announcement used to be made: Ite, missa est: Depart, you have forgiveness of sins. They cite, as proof that this is so, the fact that the Greeks used to say: Lais Aphesis... which also means that they had been pardoned. If this were so, it would be an excellent meaning; for in connection with this ceremony forgiveness of sins must always be preached and proclaimed...]
(AP XXIV:78-83,88)

The above lengthy quotations from Luther and the Book of Concord are necessary to establish the fact that our Public Confession proclaims, not by accident, that the term liturgy

1. is not a reference to just any old method, but is equivalent to the Public Ministry and the functions of the Public Minister in the Divine Service;
2. cannot be separated from the Means of Grace:
   • cannot be separated from the proclamation of the Gospel;
   • cannot be separated from the Sacraments;
3. stands as our chief form of Public Confession in Practice.

Regarding this latter point, what is that is confessed? Chiefly, that the local congregation represents the True Church.

Church in the First Sense
The One True Church, or, the Church Universal, exists only by the faith of the Saints, and is therefore Invisible.
I’m going to review what I am certain JK already knows about the term Church, and what we Lutherans confess regarding this term. The Scriptures use this term in several different ways. The first sense is what we refer to as the Church Universal. This is the One True Church, the Communion of Saints, or the Community of Believers. It includes all Saints now living and who have ever lived, who by faith have been incorporated into the Body of Christ, and it excludes all those without faith. Only by fellowship in the Church Universal can one obtain salvation, and only by faith does one enter this One True Church. This sense of the Church is referred to in Eph. 1:22-23 & 5:23-27, 1 Cor. 3:16-17, Heb 12:23 and elsewhere. Because it exists by the faith of the Saints (Saints being “all true believers”), and because only God can see faith, the Church Universal is invisible to the eyes of man, and is often referred to as the Invisible Church.

The Church Universal in two categories
The Church Universal is spoken of in Scripture as a whole, as shown above, but it is also spoken of in parts. Two parts, to be precise. On the one hand, the true Church is recognized in terms of those who have died in the Faith, who, enduring in faith to the end, have gained the final Victory. These are the Saints now in heaven, awaiting the Resurrection, and, on the basis of Rev. 2:10 & 4:4, are referred to as the Church Triumphant. On the other hand, the true Church is also recognized in terms of those still living, clinging to faith in their battle against sin, death and the Devil, as the Church Militant. Scripture describes these struggles in Eph 6:10-11, 1 Jn. 5:4, Ro. 7:14-15, and elsewhere.

The One True Church: Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic
So the One True Church, the Church Universal, or the Communion of Saints, is referred to as the Invisible Church because it exists by the faith of the Saints, and is divided into the categories of (a) the Church Militant, and (b) the Church Triumphant. Heinrich Schmid, in his Doctrinal Theology of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, describes it this way:

To the Church [Universal] belong all those who have the same faith and the same hope, however widely they may be separated one from another by space and time. The Church [Universal] embraces, therefore, not only those now living, but, as well, those who have died in the faith; and between both there is only this difference, that the latter have already reached the goal, the former are still striving after it (Church Triumphant and Church Militant, respectively). There is, therefore, only one such communion, because there is only one head to whom all are subject, and only one faith through which they can be saved. This communion we then call


holy because in it the Holy Ghost is operating, to sanctify it;
catholic, because, however widely the members of the Church are scattered, yet at all times and in all places the same faith is confessed;
apostolic, because its faith, resting upon that proclaimed by the apostles, has never, in the course of time, been changed.

Only those who belong to this communion are certain of their salvation, for the only way of salvation lies in the faith which is the faith of this communion. To this communion, moreover, the promise is given that it shall endure for all time, and it can never fall into error, because in the Word of God it possesses the eternal truth.

Schmid, H. (1889). The Doctrinal Theology of the Evangelical Lutheran Church (2nd ed. [C.A. Hay & H.E. Jacobs, Trans.]). Philadelphia: Lutheran Publication Society. (Original work published 1876). pg. 585 (pp. 598-599 in linked edition, above).

Church in the Second Sense

The True Visible church represents the Una Sancta

The local congregation, or the Visible church, being comprised of both true believers and hypocrites is not the One True Church properly speaking, but the Church Militant is among the Visible church.
In contrast to the One True Church – i.e., the Church Universal, the Communion of Saints, or the Invisible Church – a second sense in which we use the term Church is in reference to the visible organization of people called the local congregation. Sometimes people also mean the institutions of the Church on earth, to which local congregations are attached (like Synods). Either way, this is called the Visible church. The Visible church is not True Church, as both those with and without faith will be found in local congregations, but the Visible church will always strive to represent itself as a visible manifestation of the One True, Universal, or Invisible Church – holy, catholic, and apostolic.

Because of the presence of true believers in the Visible church, some refer to the Visible church as the Church Militant – but this is an error. The Church Militant is True Church, it is Invisible Church, being found only among those with faith. However, despite the presence of hypocrites in the Visible church (those without faith and on their way to hell, who yet feign trust in Christ by their public words and actions), the True Church, in the form of the Church Militant, is among the Visible church, and it is the mold of the Church Militant in which the Visible church seeks to cast herself – striving to hold on to the Truth, to maintain her orthodoxy.

Heinrich Schmid continues:

If, moreover, the members of this Communion are joined together by the like hope and the like faith, it is just as natural, as it is desired by God, that those who dwell together in the same place and at the same time, should combine in a closer, visible community; so that thus the one, universal Church should take the form of several particular churches (ecclesia universalis – particularis), and its actual existence be also externally recognized by such combination. It then becomes the duty of each such congregation to draw others also into the same saving fellowship with Christ, and for this end to employ the Means of Grace by which individuals can be gained. The particular church [or individual congregation] will then have to count all such as belonging to it, who unite themselves to it, though it be only by an outward profession... Concerning the particular church we cannot, however, assert so unconditionally, that it is a congregation of believers, i. e., of such as have received the saving grace offered to them; to it, therefore, the definition of the Church thus far given, viz., the Communion of Believers, does not apply, for in the midst of it there may be those who have not yet received the offered grace. While we count only those as belonging to the Church, as the Communion of Believers, whose treatment of the offered grace is what it should be, we must count as belonging to the particular church all those also who stand only in outward relation to and in connection with it. And thus we see ourselves driven to admit a twofold conception of the Church, viz.,

• the Church in the narrow sense, composed of only true believers [i.e., the Invisible Church], and
• the Church in the wider sense [i.e., the Visible church], a, by which we understand the congregation of those who have joined themselves together in the same confession in the use of the Sacraments (ecclesia stricte et late dicta)
.
We do not thereby assume two churches, antagonistic and standing alongside of each other; rather, the relation between them is this, that the Church in the narrower sense exists in the midst of the Church in the wider sense; but not so that the latter is numerically equal to the former, but that it contains, or at least may contain, members within itself whom we dare not count as belonging to the Church in the narrower sense.

Thus, every one will readily understand what individuals are to be counted as belonging to the Church in this wider sense, not, however, who of them belong to the Church in the narrower sense; and hence the distinction between the visible and invisible Church corresponds to that between the Church widely and narrowly considered. It becomes of the greatest importance, then, if these distinctions be made, not to transfer without ceremony the promises and predicates that are given to the Church in the narrower sense to the Church in the wider sense, which course might easily give occasion to false fear or to false hopes, and to self-deception. Concerning the latter it cannot be said, in the same sense, but only by synecdoche, that it is one, holy, catholic, and apostolic, or that it cannot fail or err; rather, from the fact that the call reaches many who do not accept it, it already is manifest, that individuals in it often fail and err, and it is quite as possible that the evil may preponderate in the Church as that the good should do so.

The Church (in the wider sense) is further called a true or a false one, not in consequence of there being a greater or smaller number of believers or unbelievers in it, but just in proportion as the doctrines of the Gospel are preached in it purely or impurely, and just in proportion as the Means by which we attain salvation are more or less purely and liberally administered in it. The pure preaching of the divine Word, and the proper administration of the Sacraments are, therefore, the works by which we may recognize the Church as a true one.

Schmid, H. (1889). The Doctrinal Theology of the Evangelical Lutheran Church (2nd ed. [C.A. Hay & H.E. Jacobs, Trans.]). Philadelphia: Lutheran Publication Society. (Original work published 1876). pp. 585-587 (pp. 599-600 in linked edition, above).

Practice marks the true Church as it exists among the Visible church: The Marks of the Church – Pure Doctrine preached, Pure Sacrament administered liberally
Minimalistic preaching of doctrine and administration of the Sacraments does not rise to the thresholds of purity and liberality (liberal in this context meaning, “often and/or in great amounts”). When a congregation is fully capable of offering the Lord’s Supper more frequently in the context of the Divine Service, but instead chooses to do so less frequently, both the liberality and the purity of its administration is negatively impacted – it’s liberality in the act of arbitrarily withholding it, and its purity in the consequent act of holding up something else, or nothing at all, as a satisfactory substitute. When the direct preaching of Scripture doctrine is supplanted by the preaching of object lessons, is riddled with homiletic comedy, or is reduced to conjecture, when the preaching of Law and Gospel gives way to preaching the third use of the Law, when preaching Sanctification overshadows the preaching of Justification, the purity of preaching is negatively impacted. Thus the Marks are judged obscured, and on this basis, the connection of the local congregation to the One True Church – that is, the connection of the Visible church to the Invisible Church – is judged less clear.

These comprise but a very short list demonstrating the result of giving in to the perspectives the Church Growth Movement (CGM), which direct the congregation to be “Real, Relevant, and Relational” – for the sake of the unchurched, no less! – because the pure doctrines of the Gospel, themselves, through the work of the Holy Spirit, and His work through the administration of the Sacraments, are somehow not as Real, not as Relevant, and not as Relational as man, through his own innovative augmentation, can make them. In giving in to CGM mandates, the congregation is seeking to answer one question modern folks are thought to have, “How does this apply to me?”; but by corrupting the Marks of the Church to do so, the congregation utterly fails to show her qualifications to authoritatively answer the question to begin with. When the perspectives of CGM are carried into practice, the Marks of the Church fall under attack, our understanding of, and identification with, the One True Church is weakened, and the confession we give to this truth in our practice is vacated. This is quite serious in and of itself, but does not even address the gravity of withholding the only operative Means from those who desperately need them. Christians looking for the One True Church will rightly pass by such congregations.

The Marks and More: Christians in a state of Confession, Lutherans mutually agree to further restrictions in practice
True Lutherans, while united in Confessional stance, also vigorously stand distinct and separate from the heterodox, and prove this separation by putting their Confession fully into practice. Lutherans are orthodox, and so, regarding the Church, reject the notion that membership in the congregation (the particular Church, or Church in the wider sense, as Schmid puts it above) is equivalent to fellowship in the One True Church. Our participation in this Invisible, though very Real, Relevant, and by definition, Relational Fellowship, is by Faith Alone. Thus we stand separate from the Romans who equate the Visible church with the Church Militant, and who attach the necessity of works to man’s Justification. Thus we also reject the practical trappings associated with these false teachings, such as the sale of indulgences and the sacrificial (rather than sacramental) Eucharist, and have ourselves corrected various corruptions of the Western Rite that were introduced by Rome to reinforce and give expression to these false teachings. Lutherans are Evangelical, and so the preaching of the Word was made to predominate the Divine Service rather than Holy Communion, as was the sacramental aspects of our worship (God coming to us through Word and Sacrament) over the sacrificial (man offering before God his sacrifices of praise, thanks, adoration, intercession and petition). As a vehicle for the public use of the Means of Grace, the liturgy was made synonymous with the Public Ministry and the function of the pastor. The liturgy is principally God’s service to man, through the Means of Grace; and the liturgy defines the “method” used by His Called servant, the man who occupies the Office of this Ministry.

Despite our separation from Rome, however, we forcefully reject the notion that we are sectarian, and also reject those practices that are of sectarian signature. Rather, like the Romans, we Lutherans share the confession in Nicene Creed that we are both catholic and apostolic, and show forth these elements of our Confession by retaining the catholic Rites. Thus, the use of the Historic Liturgy (i.e., the Western Rite), rather than any old liturgy someone just makes up – also known as disposable liturgies. Apart from historic rites and hymnody, it is impossible to show forth our catholicity and apostolicity.

Historical and liturgical worship is retained and embraced by Confessional Lutherans because of our Confession regarding the Church and her Ministry. It effectively, and thankfully, separates us from sectarians and other innovators, by maintaining the catholicity and apostolicity of our Public Confession, and the dramatic liturgical reforms introduced during the Reformation (which were reforms, not “changes”) returned the liturgy to the status of evangelical and orthodox practice, and thus also those elements of our Public Confession. The Lutheran Church, on the basis of her Confession and confessional Practice, is the True Visible Church of God on Earth.

Just a Nice Theory?
So, I’ve just let loose with copious quotations from the Lutheran Confessions and reliable sources of Lutheran Doctrine, and followed them with a chain of explanation making it perfectly plain why, from the standpoint of Confessional integrity, the Historical Liturgy must remain the public practice of Lutheran congregations. I have not directly broached the important issues of positive Fellowship (expressions of Confessional Unity with other congregations who publicly declare the same confession we do), nor of the operative liturgical principle of lex orandi, lex credendi and the impact of teaching false doctrine through anthropocentric, or other poorly informed practice. The many discussions on these and related issues on Bailing Water through the latter half of 2008 and early 2009 covered these issues exhaustively. For a review, I think a good post to reference was my response to Ben, initially posted here. Otherwise, Click Here for a more exhaustive list of discussions I was involved in.

Nevertheless, the prime question on the mind of a sold-out CGM’er is, “Uhhh... okay. Well, um, does it, you know, like... WORK?” My answer: Yes – it succeeds very well in confessing what it was designed to. Here’s a bit of anecdotal evidence to back it up.

History? Reading? Doctrine? Confession? The Church? Hunh??? Ya but, uh, does it WORK?

The Church and Change
I know from experience that life among pop-church Evangelicals is a life of change. Of constant change. Every new “spiritual fad” that comes along is enthusiastically embraced, adopted and put into practice; and what came before is unceremoniously rejected, eliminated and forgotten.

“Society changes,” they say, “so we must change!”
“It’s all about meeting people where they are at!”

Not only practice, but words change as well. Catch phrases change, everything is expressed in the vernacular of “now.” Old expressions give way to new. Nothing is constant. The result is continuous turnover, not only of practice, but of the ideas that undergird those practices – and as the words that express those ideas change, so does the teaching that accompanies them. As the practices change, so does the teaching. Nothing older than, say, five years old is remembered, and even then “way back when” is a humorous pejorative for what passed by the wayside a couple years before. Christians of previous generation(s) are laughed at as “throwbacks,” cast as those having a “deficient understanding of the Scriptures,” who, at best, may have some interesting insight from time to time, but only in some archaic sense which needs correction or illumination by “contemporary, and therefore more sophisticated and more relevant, thinking.” There is no sense among them that true Christians existed at any time of history, other than the Apostolic era, and Christian history for them ends five years ago, because that is as far back as their changing practices and expressions reach.

However, once a pop-church Evangelical actually begins to read, the a-historical intellectual poverty, doctrinal vacuity, and outright chicanery of modern CGM-infected American Christianity is exposed.

Enter Knowledge of the Past, and Tears of Joy
There are only two times that I can recall shedding tears, as an adult, over spiritual matters. The first was upon discovering and reading Heinrich Schmid’s Doctrinal Theology of the Evangelical Lutheran Church. Leading up to this, though I had a conservative Evangelical upbringing – that was never too far from the conservative Lutheranism my parents were raised in – as a college student I nevertheless wandered as an essentially nominal Christian. Nothing new here. After a long period of experimentation with different ideas (a long story), I eventually resolved that Christianity was true, and being true was of significant consequence. I wound up with the pop-church Evangelicals in college – who were overtly and publicly Christian, in confession and works. There were no Lutherans that I could discern, though I later discovered that there was an active WELS Campus Ministry program there. Interestingly, most of the individual Christians I met among the pop-Church Evangelicals, who brought me back to the Christian faith through their own empassioned and convincing explanation and living out of it, were either LCMS, ELS, or CLC – as I discovered long after the fact. There were Pentecostals, as well – but they were mostly just weird. Moreover, as I also discovered long after the fact, this campus, having a nationally acclaimed School of Agriculture, has a student body with a religious representation that is in the neighborhood of 10% WELS.

I formally introduced myself to my future wife at a Bill Gothard Seminar – having recognized her from my family’s home church. I was a graduate student then, and she was just entering college, as I recall. Shame on me? -- Well, let’s just say that by then, I knew what I was looking for, and she was it. Her family had a similar church experience to ours, and that was of primary concern to me. A couple years later, we started seeing each other under the guidance and wisdom of our parents – a two-year courtship arrangement which we had elected to follow. During this time we desired to grow together in our relationship, and we sought to do this by growing closer in our relationships with God, together. For us, this meant studying the Bible together, worshiping together, praying together, etc. Throughout this period we came to recognize very clearly that the Visible church was rife with mutually-exclusive truth-claims regarding the doctrines of Scripture, so we decided on a close study of the Bible with respect to denominational differences on disputed points. In the end, we didn't care what we called ourselves, we just wanted to believe what the Bible taught and to join with Christians who believed the same thing. Given our backgrounds, we were familiar with many claims of various groups – Roman Catholic, Pentecostal, Baptist, Lutheran, etc. By comparing those claims to Scripture, it didn't take long before what we understood as Lutheran doctrine emerged as the true champion of Scripture teaching.

The Impact of Heinrich Schmid, and the Historical Teaching of the Evangelical Lutheran Church
It was about this time that I discovered Heinrich Schmid’s work, Doctrinal Theology of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, in the basement of an old used bookstore in Minneapolis that I would visit on my lunchbreaks (I didn’t have enough money to buy food in those days – not after spending money on books, anyway...). I found the title of this work striking. I hadn’t realized that there was such a thing as “evangelical” Lutherans. To me, the two words simply did not go together. I’d never met a Lutheran who struck me as “evangelical” in the slightest. More amazing to me was the fact that these particular evangelicals had actually worked out a theology! Amazing!, I thought. Considering it a real prize, I bought that book on the spot (overpriced though it was...), though saddened to think that these “evangelical” Lutherans had since long disappeared. I wondered what nuggets of theological perspective I could glean from this old book about the teaching of extinct Christians.

When I brought the book home and began to read, I was brought to tears. After years of struggling to develop my own personal theology from my own diligent study of Scripture (which at one point I had to admit was more philosophy than theology, forcing me to start over), I discovered that the Evangelical Lutherans had worked out a very rigorous theological system that descended directly from the very words of Scripture. It was not passed through philosophical preconceptions in order to reach reasonable conclusions, but concluded only what the Scriptures stated directly. It was exceptionally well articulated, solving many of the problems I had struggled with – original sin and the nature of man, traducianism, the essence and attributes of God, the union of the two natures in Christ, the nature of the Church and its relation to other earthly institutions, etc. The inklings I had developed on my own regarding the tough doctrines of Scripture had been fully worked out by Christians who had gone before me – not five years ago, but five centuries ago. And the more I studied the more I learned that they relied heavily on the orthodox teachers that had preceded them, as well, going back to the apostles. I wept because I knew that the burden of trying to understand and articulate the true teaching of the Scriptures had been lifted – it had always been known, and for the most part, been well articulated. I just needed to hold on it, and confess it. I was no longer alone in a sea of irrelevant “relevancy,” trying to find my way in a doctrinal fog. I wanted to be a Lutheran, to find what was left of these “old evangelicals,” and join them.

I shared the book with my then (still) future wife. I’m not sure that she found Schmid quite as compelling – romantic, even – that I did. But she agreed. By the time I proposed (a few months later), we both knew that we wanted to be Lutheran, and six months later when we were married, I gave away copies of Schmid to my groomsmen. Our challenge throughout this time was to find a Lutheran church that believed its own doctrinal claims, and which preached from the Scriptures. That search lasted through our fourth Sunday as a married couple, which was the first Sunday we visited a WELS church.

The Impact of the Historical Liturgy
This was the second occasion that I can recall shedding tears, as an adult, over spiritual matters. We trembled as we walked into the WELS congregation. We had read their This We Believe. We were unnerved with the use of the word “reject” in the antithesis section, thinking that this carried over into their treatment of visitors. It took ten seconds, however, to realize that they were really nice folks – as nice as the Lutherans featured in the stories of Lake Wobegone, only more intelligent, and more intentional about what they believed and how they expressed it.

We had a few litmus tests. Preaching needed to stick to the text. It needed to include elements of doctrinal teaching, and evidence of exegetical effort (he needed to explain Hebrew/Greek words and concepts and how they applied to the meaning of the text). Equally important, the Order of Service needed to keep us focused on the Object of worship, not on us. That meant no attempt to use music or other devices to manipulate our emotional state. We were hoping for liturgy and hymns, but didn’t quite know what that meant other than, “a conservative and dignified order of service,” as opposed to what the pop-church evangelicals were dishing up every Sunday morning.

Our criteria were met. The text was Psalm 51 – the perfect Law & Gospel text if there ever was one, and the pastor not only clung to the text for dear life, he fired straight Law & Gospel from it like a machine gun, supplying a bit of doctrinal instruction along the way, explaining the difference between sin, iniquity, and trespass, and providing a brief etymology of those words as they are used in the text. We were delighted! But of course, this was icing on the cake, for we had already fallen in love with the congregation on the basis of their liturgical worship.

At first, we were impressed with the formality. People behave formally when in the presence of someone important, and we understood the presence revered by such formality to be that of Christ Himself – the King of kings. It wasn’t hard to conclude this, as all of the language uttered by the Pastor or chanted by the congregation was focused on Christ, either speaking to Him, or about what He had done for them. It was clear to us that this congregation fully believed that Christ was with them through the Service, and that on account of this fact, they were eager to behave accordingly.

The tears flowed, however, with the singing of the Psalm – Psalm 51. Not the words, but the form: Plainsong. We immediately recognized it as an ancient form, and were just as immediately united with the ancient Christians in worship – believing the same doctrines they did, we were singing the same songs they did, the same way they did. Expressing catholicity and apostolicity for the first time, we were unable to remain composed enough to complete the Psalm with the congregation. Up to that point, for us, everything had been fad and fashion, with no history older than five years, no true Christians existed other than those with us today. At that point, we understood that we were one in faith with all true Christians who had gone before us, who sacrificed dearly to maintain pure teaching through the ages and to express it in the Church’s practice. We joined that congregation.

Not just us...
We weren’t the only ones moved by the historic teachings and liturgy of Lutheranism. Serving in that congregation from that point forward for nearly a decade, as Chairman of the Board’s of Education and then Evangelism, in that time the numerous people that joined were almost all by profession of faith, either new Christians or former evangelicals -- and the significance of our worship practice was no small factor. In a discussion with one, now former pop-church evangelical, family, the husband joked, saying, “If you would have told me two years ago that (a) I would be regularly participating in liturgical worship, and (b) enjoying it, I would have laughed in your face. Today, I couldn’t imagine anything else. This is heaven.” Likewise, a conversation with a visiting family revealed that they were keenly interested in joining our congregation, having found us after a long search for a Lutheran church that preached and practiced historical doctrines and liturgy. In another case, after numerous failed attempts to get our services on the local radio station over the years, I finally called the station myself to inquire about the cost of purchasing a time slot on Sunday morning. The response was initially cool. Upon followup two weeks later the response was an enthusiastic, “Yes!” Why the difference? In the interim, the owner of the station visited our congregation to see what would be aired from their station. When I followed-up, it was explained to me that their enthusiasm stemmed from the worship experience and sound preaching: “You are real Church,” I was told. They had no time for pop-church, equating it with Sunday morning entertainment: "We can do better than that," they said, "We air the Packer game every Sunday." We were given the best time slot on Sunday morning, just before the Packer games, and members of that individual’s family have since joined that congregation.

These are only a few examples, and I could go on; but this is sufficient. Practice confesses, and this is no mere theory -- and what Historic Liturgical Lutheran Practice confesses, is quite compelling. By comparison, what faddish sectarian practices confess is neither transcendent nor permanent nor profound nor, in the end, spiritually satisfying, leading us to ourselves and our own fancies, instead of to Christ and His Church.