Encore Post: You are a good Lutheran. Really! You are a committed Christian. You go to church every Sunday, give 10% of your income to church and care for anyone in need you meet. You study the scriptures, go to Bible Study and serve in one church position after another. You even read this blog every time we post! So, when you get sick, when you are in an accident, when a flood or tornado hits your home, you cry out to God, “It isn’t fair!” And you are right — but in a way you do not expect.
When we try to be fair to others, we’re trying to do a number of things. To be fair, we strive to treat everyone the same. We try to be consistent, acting the same way every time. We give people what the rules say they deserve — no more or no less. Yet we cannot know all the factors that should influence our decision. We are, after all, human. We expect better from God.
The Scriptures tell us that God is just, righteous and even-handed. And he is God expects us to be holy in thought, word and deed. He shows no partiality.
Friedrich Wyneken‘s call for pastors to serve in America was very successful. From the beginning of his missionary work in Indiana, Ohio and Michigan, Wyneken wrote one letter after another to friends in Germany, church newspapers and anyone who would listen. A few pastors joined him on the frontier, but not nearly enough to meet the needs of the ceaseless flood of immigrants settling there. In 1841, one of these pastors came to Fort Wayne and Decatur to care for his parishes. He decided he needed to press the case in person. The General Synod agreed to send him home to do this and seek treatment for a throat ailment.
From October 20th, 1841 to July 5th, 1843, Wyneken met with people throughout Germany, raised funds, and recruited missionaries. He met with Wilhelm Löhe, who had already been working to send men to America, nicknamed Sendlinge (Sent ones) and Nothilfer (emergency helpers). They formed a friendship that shaped Löhe’s strategy, who would prepare second career men for service in America and send them to an American seminary to round out their education in country. He also helped Wyneken polish his appeal into the very successful Distress of the German Lutherans in North America. The first seminary to benefit from these students was the Ohio Synod’s german language institute in Columbus, Ohio.
175 years ago, Wilhelm Sihler, Friedrich Wyneken and the Sendlinge met in Cleveland. The American Lutheran church bodies were proving to be not very true to Lutheran doctrine and practice. Of special concern was the form of the words of institution used by the Ohio Synod (“Jesus said, “take, eat…”), which allowed for Reformed tradition Christians to commune with Lutherans, and that the Columbus seminary would not exclusively teach in German. In addition, the first issue of C. F. W. Walther’s Der Lutheraner indicated there were other confessional Lutherans in America. The wrote a joint letter, the Document of Separation, in which they all resigned from their respective Synods. They agreed to reach out Walther and the Saxons about the possibility of forming a new synod and to Löhe to found a seminary in Fort Wayne.
Encore Post: After Jesus was baptized, the Holy Spirit sent him into the desert alone for forty days to fast and pray prior to beginning his ministry. The number forty was important to the Jewish people. Their ancestors wandered in the desert for forty years. Moses and Elijah fasted for forty days in the desert. God kept Noah and his family safe in the ark for forty days. For them, the number forty stood for a period of testing. The church took its cue from these periods of testing when it chose to make the season of Lent forty days long.
After the forty days were over, Satan appeared to test him. He said: Why not turn stones into bread? Why not prove to everyone you are the Christ by jumping off the temple so that angels will catch you? You can avoid the cross by worshipping me? After all, I can give you the world!
Jesus could have blown Satan away, but He chose to face temptation in every way that we are tempted, but he did not sin. (Hebrews 4:15) He quoted the will of God from the Scriptures instead. In God’s Word is the power to overcome the Devil — and the world and our flesh, too.
Satan gave up for awhile. He knew he would have other opportunities. Ahead of Jesus was still his sufferings and death for our sins. Because He faced temptation as a human, we know He understands us and is ready to help. So, we go with him this Lent, walking with him to Jerusalem, to and through Good Friday and on to Easter.
Encore Post: Sin is one of those church words everyone knows. After all it is what is wrong with the world. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could just move to a remote place with just Christians. Then we would be in a good place (a utopia), where there is no sin — or where sin is manageable — right? Then we would be with only people who try to be good. That is what many Christians have thought in the last two thousand years. Yet it never works. Why? Because Christians, even the best of us, are still sinners. We can’t leave it behind because we bring it with us. There is no place that is “the good place” — at least not in this life!
At it’s basic level, sin is breaking God’s law. It may be by not meeting its standards (being good, but not good enough, like not lifting a hand in anger ever, but swearing at people under our breath or behind their backs). It may be by transgressing his law, going over the bright lines it lays down, or being lawless, living as if we can do anything we wish, as if there was no law. We invent good deeds that impress us to do — we fast, we go on pilgrimages, we create rituals and perform them, we advertise donating to the poor. We will do anything, except follow God’s word. Yet actual sins, things we think or do, is not the root of the problem. It is not what do, but who we are.
Since Adam and Eve committed the originalsin, we have all been born as sinners. In trying to be like God, our first parents stopping being righteous, like God. Now we are all born as slaves to sin. Just like a slave cannot free himself, we can not free ourselves. Our thoughts are curved in on themselves, even what we think are good thoughts and deeds are colored by self-interest. Because he is holy, God cannot tolerate this. So we are destined to live separated from God forever. And so we die. So, someone must set us free.
That is why the Son of God was born of a virgin. As God, he was (and is) without sin. As a human, he is able to die, taking our place in paying the full price of our freedom on the cross. When he died, we died to sin. When he rose, we rose from death with him as a child of God. In baptism, he sets us free from sin and the compulsion to sin. Now we are free people, Children of God. Sin’s power over us is broken. Now we can live a new life in him.
175 years ago, a small colony of Lutheran missionaries began to clear land in the swampy pine forests of Michigan’s Saginaw Valley. Like many other settlements in 19th century America. they fervently believed in their religion and were led by a pastor, August Crämer. Unlike most utopian movements, however, they were orthodox Christians and were not there for themselves primarily. They were missionaries to the Chippewa people. The vision of their benefactor, Wilhelm Löhe was they would reach out to these Native Americans and provide a Christian community that would be a witness to how those who love Jesus live with each other. Löhe named the town Frankenmuth — Courage of the Franconians.
The colony established itself in spite of the difficulties in settling virgin land. Giant trees had to be felled, shelters built, land plowed and a basic crop planted to survive the winter. They were plagued by malaria and other illnesses and all the while struggled to contact the Chippewas. By December, they had built the first church, St. Lorenz Lutheran Church. In the meantime, Crämer had interested the native peoples to send their children to the missionary school he would establish. The Pastor would eventually learn their language and translate the Small Catechism into their language. Soon Missionary Baierlein arrived and moved into their village. Eventually, 35 Chippewas were baptized. The Mission came to an end when the US Government relocated the tribe further west.
In the next year, ninety more colonists arrived. The community grew into a bustling farm community. Soon three more colonies would follow and prosper. Today Frankenmuth is a tourist destination for Christmas shoppers, crafts, German heritage and fine dining.
Martin Luther wrote a lot of books, pamphlets, sermons and other writings. In addition, once he was famous, his friends and students wrote down everything he said and did. These have been printed in one series of books containing all of them. They take up 120 tall volumes. So, which of these should you read to know what he taught? On everyone’s short list are two books you may have read: Luther’s Small and Large Catechisms, and others you may have not: his 1535 Galatians Commentary and three documents from 1520: A Prelude on the Babylonian Captivity of the Church, Freedom of a Christian and the subject of this post: To the Christian Nobility of the German Nation. I would add one we’ve talked about: On Good Works.
By Summer of 1520, it was clear to Luther, his prince Elector Frederick that the papacy would soon move to excommunicate Luther and perhaps other. They decided that a direct appeal to Emperor Charles and the other princes and powers of the Holy Roman Empire. The strategy was to convince them to call a Church Council to reform the church. As the document was being written, a variety of princes and other respected members of German governments urged him to provide a theological justification for the secular powers to intervene. Luther the first edition of To the German Nobility came off the press five hundred years ago by August 18, 1520.
Martin Luther answered three arguments made by defenders of the pope against the involvement of princes in the reform of the Church, which he called walls protecting him. The first was that the clergy and monks were superior to laymen spiritually and no one could approach God except through them. The second was only the pope could interpret the Scriptures correctly and third that only the pope could call a church council. The ground-breaking assertion Luther made was these were not true because the clergy are not superior to laypeople spiritually. All Christians were members of the Priesthood of All Believers, equal to the clergy spiritually and with their own, direct relationship to God. So they were also able to interpret Scripture and, as called by God to maintain order in the world and restrain evil, the princes have a right and a duty to call councils to reform the church.
With To the German Nobility, Luther had liberated the laity from dependence upon the clergy for all of their spiritual lives. Lutherans and the Reformed believers now were able to care for their own spiritual needs. The focus shifted to individual relationships between God and the believer. Western Christianity would never be the same.
In August of 1845, August “Onkel” Crämer arrived in the wilderness of Saginaw County, Michigan, as the Pastor and leader of a unique colony. Called “Frankenmuth” (The Courage of the Franconians”), this group was founded to be a witness to the Chippewa nation. The idea was to show these non-Christians what a Christian society was like. Crämer was not only their pastor, but a missionary and a translator. His work bore fruit in the baptism of Chippewa and the physical care for the tribe’s children. In 1850, he was called to be a professor at the seminary in Fort Wayne. He served the “practical seminary” the rest of his life, moving with it to St. Louis and later to its one hundred year home in Springfield, Illinois.
Crämer was born into a Bavarian merchant’s home. He was raised in a strict German fashion and eventually sent on the Gymnasium (a German preparatory high school for students destined for University study) He went on to study theology at the University of Erlangen. Under the influence of the culture of the time, he strayed from his Lutheran roots into rationalism. He became involved in a German nationalist movement that eventually made a poor attempt at a coup. The result was he was imprisoned for six years.
After he was released, he turned to the serious study of linguistics, including the languages of ancient Greek, modern Greek, old and middle High German, French, and English. During a serious illness, he turned to religion for comfort. At first, confronted by his deep sinfulness, it did anything but comfort him. But in the midst of the depression this insight caused, the words of the catechism came back to him. He now realized that God’s grace was even for him. From this great comfort came a fervent commitment to Confessional Lutheranism, not unlike his future brothers-in-ministry, C. F. W. Walther, Friedrich Wyneken, Wilhelm Sihler and others.
After completing his studies, he served first as a tutor in the household of Lord Lovelace, which did not end well when he did not convert to Unitarianism, later in the home of Henry Drummond, with a similar result, when he did not become an Irvingite and, finally, as a tutor at Oxford University with the same outcome when he did not become an Anglican. It was then that Wyneken’s Distress of the German Lutherans in North America fell into his hands. Convinced he needed to serve his countrymen in the wilderness of the United States. Wilhelm Löhe recognized his talents, arranged to have him ordained and set him over the missionary colony soon to make its way to Michigan.
When Friedrich Wyneken was called from his beloved Fort Wayne to succeed his friend Johannes Häsbärt, he refused to accept the call until a pastor was called to replace him. At his recommendation, Prussian Wilhelm Sihler, then pastor is Pomeroy, Ohio, was installed on July 15, 1845, at St. Paul Lutheran Church and Zion Lutheran Church of Friedheim, one hundred seventy-five years ago. He served in Indiana for forty years, founding Concordia Theological Seminary, leading the teaching seminary that would grow into Concordia University Chicago and guiding Concordia (Junior) College of Fort Wayne. Together with C. F. W. Walther, Wyneken and others, he helped to found and guide the Lutheran Church — Missouri Synod.
Sihler was the son of a Prussian Army officer and inherited from him a strong sense of discipline, devotion to exercise and control of one’s emotions. He studied under Friedrich Schleiermacher, one of the most influential theological voices of the 19th Century. He was attracted to the German Awakening, a form of pietism not unlike the Second Great Awakening in the United States. Like many of his contemporaries, including the other founders of the Missouri Synod, he was drawn to the Orthodox Lutheran theology, especially as found in the Lutheran Confessions and the writings of Martin Luther.
In 1843, a copy of Wyneken’s Distress of the German Lutherans of North America fell into his hands. Moved to help German immigrants on the American frontier, he came to America as a teacher, but was soon called as a pastor in Pomeroy, Ohio. Wyneken and Löhe convinced him to embrace F. C. D.’s idea to found a seminary for second career pastors nicknamed Nothilfer (“Emergency Helpers”) and Sendlinge (“Sent Ones”) By then, Tens of Thousands of Germans each year poured onto the American frontier, looking to carve new lives out of virgin forests and swamp land. There was little time to follow the usual path of identifying future pastors in their middle school years, provide a classical high school education followed by seminary. Löhe provided an initial education in Germany and Sihler and his assistant pastor would complete it.
Sihler also saw the inadequacy of existing Lutheran Synods in America, as did the men Löhe had already sent — and Wynken. They began to discuss with C. F. W. Walther the possibility of joining with the Saxons to form a new church body. But that was yet to come.
For the better part of a year and a half, Luther was on a collision course with the papacy and its supporters. At first Luther did not realize the full implications of his challenge of indulgences. It surprised him that the reaction of his opponents was not to engage him on indulgences or penance, but to criticize him for implying that the Pope‘s word was not final on the subject.
Rather than engage Luther in a debate on the subject from the Scripture, the defenders of the papacy argued from the official documents of the church, pronouncements of the pope and councils. This drove Luther deeper into his study of the Bible where he discovered more and more problems with the teachings of the church. The alarm grew among his opponents with each new writing. These became very popular and soon Luther was the most read author in Germany.
Luther’s prince, Frederick the Wise, was a very accomplished politician and skillfully used his importance to the Pope when the throne of the Holy Roman Empire was vacant to protect Luther. Once Charles I, King of Spain, was elected Emperor Charles V, the Pope no longer needed the elector quite as much. Both Luther and his prince knew that it was only a matter of time before the Pope would act against the reformer. As rumors of a bull began to filter back to Germany, they began to shift their attention to winning over the Emperor to their cause.
At the end of June 1520, Luther’s tract On the Papacy in Rome appeared. It was a polemical writing (a political attack on his opponents, using insults, humor and sarcasm. The reformer and his adversaries would become known for this style of writing) In it he argued that the pope was not appointed by divine right, but by human arrangement. To criticize the pope, then, was not to criticize God. All ministers of the gospel are equal. The pope was the Bishop of Rome and not the vicar (assistant, substitute) So all the teachings of the pope need to be evaluated by the scripture and held to what the Lord reveals. It the course of this writing, Luther shows an avoidance of the word kirche, church, Instead he uses the word Christendom, which he defines as a spiritual communion, which is not governed by earthly considerations.
