Does Paul McCain Read CPH Books? Especially Those with His Name on Them?

bruce-church (http://bruce-church.myopenid.com/) has left a new comment on your post "Bedfellows of Apostasy - Paul McCain, FB Friends w...":

Paul Rydecki comments on Facebook, referring to McCain:

I'm trying to figure out at what point it became anathema in the Lutheran Church to teach justification according to Augsburg Confession, Art. IV. I'll even quote from the McCain translation:

"Our churches teach that people cannot be justified before God by their own strength, merits, or works. People are freely justified for Christ’s sake, through faith, when they believe that they are received into favor and that their sins are forgiven for Christ’s sake. By His death, Christ made satisfaction for our sins. God counts this faith for righteousness in His sight (Romans 3 and 4 [3:21–26; 4:5])."

Concordia: The Lutheran Confessions. 2005 (P. T. McCain, Ed.) (33). St. Louis, MO: Concordia Publishing House.

Justified when? "When they believe..." Received into favor when? Present tense. Sins are forgiven why? For Christ's sake. Sins are forgiven when? Present tense. Christ made satisfaction when? On the cross (past tense).

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GJ -

UOJ was not the ruling norm on justification until after the Brief Confession of 1932. That could not have been with the German catechism and the Luther materials used before that time. But WWI made the German language something to be shunned.

The Walther claque slowly took over via Francis Pieper and Stoeckhardt. The bad yeast slowly permeated the Synodical Conference. Finally it became acceptable to drive someone out in the name of UOJ, as the Preus brothers did with Walther A. Maier, denying him the presidency of the practical seminary. Robert Preus was the beneficiary of that controversy.

WELS had its show-trial with Kokomo, driving two families out in the name of universal forgiveness without faith.

The literature shows that both sects were teaching justification by faith in their own catechisms, but that is now so buried that McCain can rave against justification by faith while selling a catechism that is only justification by faith.

The Robert Preus Fan Club cannot bring themselves to address the obvious repudiation of UOJ in Justification and Rome.

DP Jon Buchholz wrote to me, four years ago, 8-27-2008:

You mentioned the concern that confessional guys get nailed and ousted, while enthusiasts don’t. I share that concern, but there’s also a reason why that happens: Enthusiasts don’t confess. Pinning them down is like trying to nail Jell-o to a wall. Their sins are sins of glaring omission in matters of doctrinal truth, not often glaring sins of commission that can easily be identified, confronted and disciplined. They often say one thing (in lip-service) but do another. When their outrageous, aberrant statements are challenged, they reply, “Well, what I meant was . . . “ and then recouch their view in orthodox Lutheran terminology. And since we’re operating in a legalistic environment of literalistic Biblicism where “only chapter and verse matter,” the problem is doubly compounded. Believe me, it’s a very challenging and vexing problem.

Go back again and read Bente’s history of the crypto-Calvinist controversy, and you’ll see similar challenges that were very difficult to confront in that day. In fact, had not the cryptos slipped up and tipped their hand as to their real agenda, I sometimes wonder whether the gnesio-Lutherans would have prevailed as they did. (I’m talking here specifically about enthusiast pastors who are difficult to discipline in congregations, not published authors who have flagrantly revealed their doctrine and haven’t been disciplined. That’s a different, albeit related, problem).

[end of Buchie quote]

Buchholz was wrong in claiming that Enthusiasts don't confess. They never stop yakking. He is a prime example, extolling his personal version of UOJ at every stop. He admitted in his email that he is "not apt to teach" and unqualified to be a pastor. Neither is he discerning. I doubt that he ever read Thy Strong Word, although he is the one who wanted to discuss justification with me. I have an entire chapter on Zwingli and Calvin, quoting Bente of all people. But how would he know, even though Brett Meyer gave him a free copy to study.

I found it quite amusing that he told me to study Bente on the crypto-Calvinists. An NPH book book noted that in WELS the Calvinists were no longer crypto. Once again, Buchholz is the prime example of that, marketing his UOJ paper as the last word in Lutheran Orthodoxy when he does not even grasp justification and cannot be called a Lutheran - not even a mild Lutheran.

The previous inept DP out in the West was Jahnke, who was famous for yanking pastors from the ministry, although that man was less savage, heavy-handed, and overbearing than Buchholz. One Lutheran observer said Buchie was already trying on his jackboots as a tutor, insisting that he be called Tutor Buchholz at all times. The Changers in WELS (Lawrenz, Olson) are very fussy about their names.

SP Mark Schroeder and DP Jon Buchholz have both shown their willingness to come down hard on the side of false doctrine and practice, as public absolvers of immoral church workers and private opponents of the truth.

Has any Church and Changer be disciplined in WELS? Ever?
Image courtesy of Joe Krohn.