Herman Otten recently decried Lutheran groups splitting, but he comes from the era of synods modeled after General Motors - a fact well known about the LCA corporate structure. The LCA, now ELCA, has gone the way of GM.
Someone asked about Intrepid Lutherans and the discussions on the liturgy.
In WELS especially, every battle is a proxy war. The real topic is not the subject mentioned. It stands for something else.
Those emphasizing liturgy are criticizing Church and Change. They imply this without saying it.
For Church and Change, promoting the liturgy is a legalistic stance, their way of dismissing the confessional Lutherans as false teachers. They imply this without saying it.
The Church and Money Changers are nasty, unscrupulous, dishonest, and greedy. Their love of false doctrine is exceeded only by their lust for loot.
The question is whether the apostates can be converted or expelled by the politeness of the Intrepid Lutherans.
I see three positive signs, in spite of my general gloom (based on the evidence) about Lutherans in general:
- WELS laity and pastors are working together in the open and expressing themselves on a group blog.
- The Anything Goes district is giving the Book of Concord as a confirmation gift. That is like finding out that the Billy Graham Crusade is reprinting What Luther Says.
- WELS is promoting the Confessions from the top down, a complete reversal from the apostate leadership of the last 33 years, when Ron Roth's Church Growth was allowed to sow its toxic seed.
WELS is tiny, so changing direction is more a case of digging one oar in a little harder.
WELS and Missouri have abandoned the Confessions so long that people are hungering for something doctrinal rather than listening to practical advice from the Babtists and New Agers.
That will put pressure on the Little Sect to have doctrinal leadership. Orvick and Pope John were both products of the WELS CG faction.
2 comments:
The question is whether the apostates can be converted or expelled by the politeness of the Intrepid Lutherans.
This is one half of the issue. Can they convert those who are manipulating the Synod and laity, to achieve their New Age Emergent success, with polite discourse on issues that are a result of the core problems and not the core problems themselves? Note that the apostates who have ushered in the New Age doctrines and practices have been exposed to and confronted with the refutations of their actions with Scripture and the Confessions by concerned laity, and have at one time taken an oath to uphold the teachings of Scripture and the BOC before. They have already rejected these for the wisdom and success of men.
The other half of the issue is the laity. Can the IL overcome the effect of doing nothing for years by discussing the fringe effects of the core problems? Can it be accomplished without offending anyone? Without giving specific examples? IL is waging a gentle 30 year campaign in a war that has been waging for years and will be over in 5-10 - it may already be over. Combine that with the fact that the majority of the (W)ELS clergy and laity take their sole lead on what to believe and confess from the authority of the Synod and not Scripture and the Confessions. The fact that IL represents only a few hearty souls means that the laity will feel far safer following the same old path than to take a chance on Scripture and the Confessions. Fear replaces faith and the (W)ELS have destroyed faith with their central doctrine of UOJ. Unless IL starts at the central article of Christian faith they will simply be rearranging the chairs and ironing the linen on the Titanic.
This is not to say that Scriptural and Confessional efforts are without benefit as God works through the Means of Grace alone and the Word purely taught and Sacraments rightly distributed always work to either harden sinful hearts or create contrition and saving faith in those God has called by His grace. The application of the medicine needs to exceed the extent of the infection.
Hi Dr. Jackson, You're right about the GM model, now that I think of it. Just as GM has sold off brands, and Ford just announced it's getting rid of its Mercury brand, so the synods have been peeling off ministries they used to support. About the only function the LCMS synodical HQ overseas now is the pension plan and its expensive healthcare plan (with shrinking enrollment), and the seminaries and missionaries etc are nearly self-supporting. In fact, I hear that the synod HQ actually taxes the missionaries, meaning the synod gets a cut of whatever they bring in. The WELS synod HQ defunded the civilian chaplains 5 years ago. The synods don't announce this broadly because they hope the donors keep assuming giving to synod means supporting chaplains, missionaries, and seminaries.
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