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| Art by Norma Boeckler. |
Visitors come to this blog and wonder what Universal Objective Justification is, so I will summarize the discussion briefly.
Justification means being declared forgiven of all sins by God. The Holy Spirit works through the Gospel to create faith, and that faith receives all the blessings of the Gospel. This Gospel is the invisible Word of teaching and preaching, the visible Word of the Sacraments. That is why the Word and Sacraments are called Means of Grace, since they are God's instruments of grace to bring forgiveness to people.
The Bible, Luther, the Book of Concord, and Lutheran theologians all teach justification by faith. The Lutheran theologians include Melanchthon, Chemnitz, Chytraeus, Andreae, Gerhard, Calov, Quenstedt, and many others.
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| Pastor Paul Rydecki translated Hunnius, who eviscerated Samuel Huber. |
Samuel Huber, UOJ Stylist
UOJ first appeared shortly after the Book of Concord was published in 1580. Samuel Huber, a partial convert from Calvinism, got a teaching gig at Wittenberg and began railing against justification by faith. Alas, he was like a gunman robbing a gun store. The Lutheran orthodox opened up on him. Polycarp Leyser, the biographer of Chemnitz, an expert on justification, and Hunnius, another genius, shredded the weak arguments of Huber and removed him from his post.
Huber taught that everyone was already righteous, by virtue of Christ's resurrection.
Pietism and Halle University, the Mother Ship of Blended Doctrine
Pietism won the battle against Lutheran orthodoxy, and Halle University served as the main (but not the only) source of Pietistic ministers and missionaries.
UOJ emerged again with the peculiar argument of the Halle Pietist Rambach and others that the entire world was absolved of sin the moment Christ rose from the dead. Although Romans 4:25 is commonly used today for this bizarre notion, Rambach argued his case from 1 Timothy 3:16.
Rambach's world absolution is still argued by Jay Webber (ELS) and Jon-Boy Buchholz, the tantrum prone WELS District President.
Stephan-Walther UOJ Sex Cult Expelled from Europe
Bishop Martin Stephan, who infected his wife and children with syphilis, gathered the Walther circle of Pietists around him, demanding total obedience in all his edicts. Pietism was the alternative to state-sponsored rationalism, so the Walther group gravitated from one abusive Pietistic leader (Johann Gottlieb Kuehn) to another (Stephan) when Kuehn died.
When Stephan's troubles from adultery and misuse of money grew, he planned a mass exodus to America, the first such emigration from Europe. He was under house arrest until his departure, when he took his main mistress along (Louise Guenther) and left his wife and children in Dresden to manage without him. Stephan only took his healthy son along, even though the society made arrangements for the entire Stephan family to move.
Walther and his brother kidnapped their niece and nephew from their father's parsonage, so Walther escaped arrest warrants (unlike his future mother-in-law) and left Europe in a hurry.
Walther's UOJ
Walther's UOJ never varied from what he gained from Stephan, a fact that should make his diminishing fan club shudder.
Walther taught that God declared the entire world absolved of sin. People just needed to be told they were already forgiven and then believe in this world absolution. He later approved the double-justification language from the English translation of Knapp, the Halle Pietist.
Walther was unable to gain total dominance of the Halle position in the Synodical Conference.
Gausewitz was president of the Synodical Conference, and his catechism did not teach UOJ.
Hoenecke graduated from Halle, but he definitely gave UOJ a light touch in his Dogmatics.
Concordia Publishing House still publishes a KJV catechism (2 million in print!) that omits UOJ entirely.
UOJ, Church Growth, and Gay Activism
The UOJ advocates (WELS COP, Valleskey, Bivens, Wayne Mueller, VP Huebner, SP Mark Schroeder) are also the Church Growth salesmen in their synods (denying it, of course).
Gay activism thrives in the Fuller Seminary alumni, whether they are nominal Lutherans like Mark Schroeder, or emergent church gurus like Andy Stanley or Brian Mclaren.
