2. The false doctrines of the Church.
It is in the nature of things that all former doctrinal sins reappear in the doctrine of the Church. Since membership in the Christian Church is only mediated through faith in Christ, the scriptural doctrine of the church has the same prerequisites as the scriptural doctrine of justification by faith. It presupposes the objective reconciliation of the whole world of sinners through Christ's satisfactio vicaria, the presentation of the forgiveness of sins through the means of grace, the appropriation of the forgiveness of sins through faith, which comes into being and is sustained without human involvement, solely through the action of the Holy Spirit. Where these conditions are not present, consequently the scriptural concept of the Church is also abandoned. It is useful and necessary to explain this in more detail.
465 > The Christian Church. [English ed. ~ 402-403]
1. The Christian concept of the church presupposes the satisfactio vicaria. To all deniers of the satisfactio vicaria, the Christian church is not the congregation of believers, that is, of those who believe by the action of the Holy Spirit that they have a gracious God through Christ's substitutionary work, but a society of men who, prompted by Christ's example, the "historical Christ," etc., want to come to God by the way of their own morality (moral-influence theory). Thus, despite some differences in expression, the Unitarians of old (Photinians, Socinians, Rationalists) and of more recent times (Horace Bushnell, Ritschl, Harnack of Berlin, Eliot of Harvard).1454) Whether one calls that which makes one a member of the Christian church "faith" or "love" or otherwise: in the denial of satisfactio vicaria, all explanations ultimately come down to Röhrs' definition of the church: the church is "a free association of rational beings for the realization of an earthly and heavenly bliss conditioned by religious enlightenment and virtue."1455) But it is not advisable to join or remain in this "church" because, according to Scripture, in the way of one's own morality, even if inspired by Christ's example or the "historical Christ," since the Fall, men do not enter the Christian church but remain under the curse1456) and sharply divorced from Christ and his church.1457) One should also not judge,1458) that men like Ritschl, Wendt and others have initiated a "return" to the original Lutheran concept of church, because they want to eliminate the "institutional" from the concept of church and prefer to call the church the "people of God," "true Christianity," etc. Because, in spite of the correct designation of the church as the "people of God" with the essential deity of Christ, they also deny the satisfactio vicaria, so to them "God's people" and "true Christianity" is merely a moral society.1459)
1454) Cf. II, 422 ff.: "Historical Information on the Doctrine of Vicarious Satisfaction" and "More Detailed Description of Modern Theories of Reconciliation".
1455) In Hase, Hutt. red., § 124.
1456) Gal. 3:10.1457) Gal. 5:4; 4:21-31.
1458) Nitzsch-Stephan, Ev. Dogmatik, p. 629 f.
1459) Ritschl, Rechtf, u. Versöhnung 3 III, 271: " The kingdom of God is those who believe in Christ, provided that they … act mutually out of love, and thus the fellowship of the moral mind and moral goods, which spreads out in all possible gradations to the limits of the human species. “
466 > The Christian Church. [English ed. ~ 404]
Luther judges of all who deny the "cost," that is, the vicarious satisfaction of Christ, that they are to be put in one class with "Turks and Jews.""1460) Incidentally, Horace Bushnell and also Ritschl are reported to have returned to belief in the satisfactio vicaria on their deathbeds.1461) — The Papal Church, to be sure, wants Christ's divinity and Christ's merit to stand. It even pronounces anathema on those who deny Christ's merit. 1462) But it places next to Christ's merit as necessary for the attainment of grace and salvation the "keeping of the commandments of God and of the Church"1463) and the merit of one's own works.1464) Since the assertion of one's own works and one's own merit excludes from the attainment of God's grace and membership in the Christian church,"1465) the papal church, by its official doctrine, places itself outside of Christendom, extra ecclesiam.1466) It then goes one step further with energy and pronounces excommunication on all those who, through faith in the forgiveness of sins for Christ's sake, want to become justified before God without their own works — that is, on the entire Christian church.1467) In the struggle pro domo, the papal church lets the church consist of such men who submit to the supremacy of the Pope and his doctrines and commandments.1468) That
Modern Unitarians are fond of using the expression "kingdom of God." The kingdom of God, however, is to them the kingdom in which God "asserts himself as sole ruler" for the moral betterment of mankind.
1460) St. L. XI, 1085.
1461) Cf. the quotations II, 442 ff. Strong, Syst. Theology, p. 739 sq; Trench, Notes on the Parables of Our Lord, on Luke 18:9-14.
1462) Trident, sess. VI, can. 10 a.<w:t>1463) Trident, op. cit. 20.
1464) Trident, op. cit. 32.<w:t>1465) Gal. 3:10; 5:4; Rom. 11:6.
1466) Cf. Luther in the Large Catechism, M. 458, 56 [Trigl. 693, Art. III, 56 🔗].
1467) Trident, sess. VI, can. 11. 12.
1468) Trident, sess. VI, decretum de ref., c. 1, the pope is called ipsius Dei in terris vicarius. Let no one presume to understand Scripture contra eum sensum, quem tenuit et tenet sancta mater ecclesia, the pope's church. Vatican II of 1870 then adds explicitly that the pope's determinations on faith and life "ex sese, non autem ex consensu ecclesiae, irreformabiles esse." (The Canons and Decisions of the Vatican Council, ed. Schneemann, p. 45 sq.) Sess. IV, decr. de usu s. librorum. Bellarmin, therefore, describes De eccl. milit. c. 2, 9, the Church as coetum hominum, eiusdem Christianae fidei professione et eorundem sacramentorum communione colligatum, sub regimine legitimorum pastorum ac praecipue unius Christi in terris vicarii Romani pontificis.
467 > The Christian Church. [English ed. ~ 404-405]
there are still members of the Christian church under the papacy is only due to the fact that baptized children believe in Christ and also otherwise souls in anguish of conscience and especially in distress of death, in spite of the "church" prohibition and curse, abandon their own works together with the merit of the saints and trust only in Christ's merit.1469) — But not only declared Unitarians and "liberal" theologians like Bushnell and Ritschl, but also "positive" ones like Hofmann and Kirn reject the satisfactio vicaria.1470) Hofmann is known to have strongly opposed the vicarious satisfaction of Christ.1471) Kirn wants to include the remolding or reshaping of humanity's life into its Godly form in reconciliation with God.1472) This interference of sanctification with justification does not allow for faith in the forgiveness of sins acquired by Christ and offered in the means of grace, and thus for membership in the Christian church. All Protestant theologians who reject satisfactio vicaria as too "juridical" and want to include in reconciliation with God the "religious-moral" transformation of humanity have crossed over into Roman territory. To them, the Church is not the congregation of believers, but a society of men who supplement Christ's merit by reshaping or transforming their own lives, that is, by sanctification and their own works. It is not faith in what Christ did and suffered in the place of men nineteen hundred years ago that makes one a member of the Christian church, but that which Christ's atonement works in men, namely, the reshaping of their lives "into His Godly likeness." Kirn: "What thus unfolds in history is co-established for God's judgment in the accomplished work of redemption, and this its effective power is co-establishing for its value before God." 1473) Hence Kirn's description of the Church "as the fellowship of the religious-moral life determined by Christ's Spirit."1474) In short, anyone who does not believe the perfect reconciliation of all mankind brought about by Christ's substitutionary satisfaction (the objective reconciliation),
1469) The Apology 151, 269-271 [Trigl. 225, art. III, 269-271 🔗]: Etiamsi in ecclesia pontifices aut nonnulli theologi ac monachi docuerunt remissionem peccatorum, gratiam et iustitiam per nostra opera et novos cultus quaerere ..., mansit tamen apud aliquos pios semper cognitio Christi. [Google]
1470) II, 429 ff.<w:t xml:space="preserve">1471) II, 431 ff.<w:t xml:space="preserve">1472) II, 472.
1473) Ev. Dogmatik, p. 118.<w:t>1474) op. cit., p. 130.
468 > The Christian Church. [English ed. ~ 405-406]
has lost the object of justifying and saving faith; consequently, the Christian church is not the congregation of believers either, but a society of complements of Christ's merit. The fellowship of grace with God is not founded on favor Dei propter Christum, but on an imagined gratia infusa. The gratia infusa is an imaginary one because it is always present only as a consequence and effect of faith in favor Dei propter Chrisutm. — It should also be noted that all those who want to limit the satisfactio vicaria extensively, that is, who do not want it to extend to all men, thereby abandon the Christian concept of the Church. If all men without distinction are not reconciled to God through Christ, the means of grace are not a sure revelation and presentation of God's gracious will to those who use them (thus not testimonia, tesserae, signa, sigilla gratiae Dei propter Christ peccata remittentis). Faith lacks the object by which it arises and exists. With the Calvinist limitation of the satisfactio vicaria to a part of the men, there can be no congregations of believers. That there is nevertheless still a church among the Calvinists is due to the fact that in the need of practice they refer the consciences struck by God's law to the general promises of grace and retire the gratia particularis invented at the study table.
The Christian concept of the church also presupposes the Christian doctrine of the means of grace. Adolf Harnack rebukes Luther for having allowed himself to become involved in a struggle over the means of grace."1475) Luther is said to have thus left the church a "disastrous legacy" and to have "retreated into the abandoned narrow circles of the Middle Ages by singling out certain actions as 'means of grace!'" But Luther knew very well why he had to fight the battle for "certain means of grace." We men need the means of grace in order to enter and remain in the Christian church. All those who, like Zwingli and Calvin, not only think that the Holy Spirit does not need a vehicle (vehiculum, plaustrum) for His revelation of grace and His efficacy of grace, but also teach positively that the effect of
1475) Wesen des Christentums 3, p. 183 f.; Grundriß d. Dogmengesch.4 , p. 431.
469 > The Christian Church. [English ed. ~ 406-407]
saving grace takes place without means of grace and alongside them ("Efficacious grace acts immediately. Here is no place for the use of means"), thus absolutely abandon the Christian church. Here is no place for the use of means"), thus absolutely abandon the Christian church. The reason is this: Since the assumed immediate efficacy of the Holy Spirit is not a reality but an imagination, the church founded on it is also a mere imagination. That there is still a Christian church in the fellowships which officially teach the immediate efficacy of the Holy Spirit, comes only from the fact a) that, in contradiction with their official doctrine, they themselves are not silent, but still teach Christ's substitutionary satisfaction, and thereby give the Holy Spirit opportunity to work faith in the Gospel through the Gospel, b) from the fact that, likewise in direct contradiction with their official doctrine, they call the Word of the Gospel incidentally the foundation of faith, and call for faith in the Word.1476) — Among those who abandon the means of grace and thus the Christian concept of church are also the modern experiential theologians who want to base faith in Christ not only on Christ's Word, but besides that also on "the historical impression of the Person of Christ," the historical "appearance of Christ," and so on. Since it is clear from Scripture that the "Person of Christ" carries out all "impressions" for the gathering and preservation of the church through the Word,1477) the church conceived by modern experiential theologians is also a non-ens. No one has "experienced" Christ, and no one will experience Christ until the Last Day except through faith in the λόγος τής καταλλαγής, in the word of reconciliation accomplished through Christ. "Experiential theology" walks in the paths of the Zwinglian-Calvinian rapture of a spiritual revelation and spiritual activity apart from and apart from the external word of the gospel. If through the activity of the experiential theologians men still become faithful to Christ, this can only happen through the inconsistency that we also find in Zwingli, Calvin and their comrades.
3. The Christian concept of the church as the congregation of believers is also set aside by those who, together with Rome, teach the sacraments as an assignment of grace ex opere operato, that is, without faith
1476) So also Calvin, Inst. III, 2, p.
1477) Joh. 8:31-32; 17:20; 15:3; 6:63-69; 1 Tim. 6:3-5 etc.
470 > The Christian Church. [English ed. ~ 407-408]
being present on the part of man as a means of appropriation. Thus a number of more recent Lutherans who teach a kind of physical effect of the sacraments. Delitzsch expressly declares his dissent from the older Lutheran teachers who deny to all unbelievers membership in the church "which is the body of Christ."1478) In contrast, it is to be noted: As certain as the sacraments are absolutely reliable testimonies of God's gracious will toward all who use them, it is also certain that the grace witnessed and thereby offered is appropriated only through faith. Where there is no faith, there is no appropriation of grace, despite all the use of the sacraments, and therefore no membership in the Christian Church. Thus the thirteenth article of the Augustana teaches of the sacraments "that they are signs and testimonies of divine will toward us, to awaken and strengthen our faith thereby, for which reason they also require faith" [Trigl. 49: Article XIII, #1-3].1479)
4. The faith by which a man becomes a member of the Christian Church is in solidum an effect of the Holy Spirit and does not stand "in some, the least, or the least part" in the free will of man.1480) Therefore, the church as "the congregation of believers" in the scriptural sense abandons all those who teach and seek to bring about a faith that is not in solidum an effect of the Holy Spirit, but also involves a human achievement, in that they cause faith to come into being and exist through a "moral human act," "inner resolution," "self-decision," "self- determination," "right conduct," a lesser guilt in comparison with others, etc. Also a binding with this "church" is not advisable. A church coming into existence by human will, inner resolution, self- determination, etc., would very soon be overwhelmed by the gates of hell. This is why the Scriptures so powerfully emphasize the divine establishment and preservation of the church.1481) Because God alone works and maintains faith without human cooperation, He alone also establishes and maintains the Christian Church.
1478) Cf. the quotation in Baier-Walther III, 620; also the detailed evidence in the 2nd Synod Report of the Western District. Writings that belong here are, among others: Franz Delitzsch, Vier Bücher von der Kirche, 1847; Loehe, Kirche u. Amt, 1851; Kliefoth, Acht Bücher v. d. K., 1854; Münchmeyer, Die Lehre v. d. sichtb. u. unsichtb. K., 1854.
1479) Cf. the evidence in L. u. W. that this is also the doctrine of the old Lutheran teachers, volume 1857, p. 4 ff; 1856, p. 144 ff.
1480) F. C. 594, 25. [Trigl. 891, Sol. Decl., II, 25 🔗]1481) Ps. 100, 3; Rom. 11:4 f.
471 > The Christian Church. [English ed. ~ 408-409]