WELS Pastor Tim Glende pretends to be shocked that I study a noted Lutheran scholar like Reu. He prefers to plagiarize from an anti-Lutheran clown named Groeschel. This is really aimed at the Intrepids (sic), but a double-edged sword can slice and dice in two directions at once.
The Intrepids (sic)--also nicknamed the Insipids--have embarked on a crusade to cover up the differences between their crypto-Universalistic UOJ and justification by faith. The most casual reader must wonder why they have departed from their original course to defend UOJ while suddenly declaring the problem is sloppy language. Jay Webber, MDiv, has been marketing that argument for decades. He should go to graduate school some day and turn that into a thesis, or perhaps a DMin paper.
Language is thought, because we use words to convey thinking. Notice how they juggle words to say that the Atonement is justification by faith, blending two different concepts into one blob of confusion. And they deny the foundation of their argument, which is based on two justification. Poof! Now there is just one justification.
Reu had these bozos nailed 70 years ago, before most of us were born. They never care to explicate the Formula of Concord, because they cannot.
Professor Reu on Unionism
From Megatron, the Legendary Database
"Here we discover the first mark of unionism: A difference in doctrine which hitherto has been regarded as divisive, is suddenly made to lose its divisive significance." (About the Augsburg Confession, Variata, Real Presence) M. Reu, In the Interest of Lutheran Unity, Columbus: The Lutheran Book Concern, 1940, p. 19.
"The second mark of unionism, therefore, is this: Differences in doctrine are made to lose their divisive significance with a view to uniting hitherto separate churches." (about unification of all Protestant forces) M. Reu, In the Interest of Lutheran Unity, Columbus: The Lutheran Book Concern, 1940, p. 19.
"The third mark of unionism, therefore, is this: A formula of unification is found which each of two hitherto separate churches may accept but which each of them interprets differently. An external bond is found for internally divided groups." (About Melanchthon using 1 Cor. 10:16 as the basis for uniting the Reformed and Lutherans, Luther's favorite text against the Reformed.) M. Reu, In the Interest of Lutheran Unity, Columbus: The Lutheran Book Concern, 1940, p. 19. 1 Corinthians 10:16.
"Doctrinal indifference is at once the root of unionism and its fruit. Whoever accepts, in theory as well as in practice, the absolute authority of the Scriptures and their unambiguousness with reference to all fundamental doctrines, must be opposed to every form of unionism." M. Reu, In the Interest of Lutheran Unity, Columbus: The Lutheran Book Concern, 1940, p. 20.
"We find this attitude of tolerance quite frequently among unionists. It is often used to assuage a troubled conscience, one's own as well as that of others; for the unionist declares that every one may continue to hold his own private convictions and merely needs to respect and tolerate those of another. This attitude is totally wrong, for it disregards two important factors: (a) in tolerating divergent doctrines one either denies the perspicuity and clarity of the Scriptures, or one grants to error the right to exist alongside of truth, or one evidences indifference over against Biblical truth by surrendering its absolute validity; and (b) in allowing two opposite views concerning one doctrine to exist side by side, one has entered upon an inclined plane which of necessity leads ever further into complete doctrinal indifference, as may plainly be seen from the most calamitous case on record, viz., the Prussian Union." M. Reu, In the Interest of Lutheran Unity, Columbus: The Lutheran Book Concern, 1940, p. 20.
