I read your posts from 2018 about my family and I leaving the LCMS for Orthodoxy. The debate between Lutherans on justification by faith and UOJ was not among the most important issues for me in the decision. You published a comment by one of your readers that demonstrated my writing on "No Longer Sola" explained that well enough.
Ecclesiology and Lutheran practices surrounding admission to the Eucharist were of much more importance for me. There is no Lutheran church body, there is no communion of Lutheran congregations that maintain a quia subscription to the Lutheran confessions. That subscription is essential for establishing the existence of the evangelical Lutheran church in any sense that isn't a useless abstraction. From my point of view it's an objective fact that there is no Lutheran church, based on her own criteria for establishing the "what" and the "where" of the Church.
It is puzzling to me how little self-reflection some Lutherans seem to be willing to do about why Lutheran pastors and laity leave the various synods for Orthodoxy. Rather than actually listening to what those who leave say about it, the choice to leave is usually dismissed as being caused by some defect in the man, which is easy and convenient, but unhelpful for a person who actually cares about the health and well-being of Lutheranism as a movement or church. I think a significant reason that men continue to leave the various Lutheran synods for Orthodoxy is caused by Lutherans who are unwilling to seriously reflect on the problem and actually understand Orthodoxy on its own terms rather than understanding the Church filtered through Lutheranism's 500+ year fight with Rome.
In Christ,
J.A.M.
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| The original joke is - "The bishop also moves obliquely in chess." That means he or she never tells the truth or shades the meaning of everything so much that no one really knows. Ask Jim Heiser for tips on this, except he never tells the truth. |
From Another Reader - with permission:
I read your latest post about the LCMS Pastor who became Eastern Orthodox. I am not sure it is solely because of UOJ. I went to his blog and read a couple of his posts. He is arguing that liturgy and practice do matter. This is going to continue happening. I say the same thing to my husband all the time. The Lutheran Church I grew up in was very strict in matters of liturgy and practice. Now I am being told that it is adiaphora. We can all worship how we are moved. For your church that may be with Keith Getty music, but it doesn’t matter. We are all one. To which I ask, “Are you really sure about that?” What am I going to be told is adiaphora next? If we can just change practice depending how I feel, why not just change the whole thing? I believe the truth of Sola Scriptura, but worship and practice do matter. They are a mirror of our doctrine. They are a reflection of who we are. If we are not teaching that, we are failing. I am sure the Pastor who left has more reasons. I am sure the struggle for him was real. I find that the Lutheran Church does not want to address this. They are fine with the fact that they are fractured. How many more people are struggling inside?
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GJ - The synods are happy to grab the tuition money, so they keep their eyes half-shut when a paying customer is in the seminary. Having someone leave afterwards is not so bad, because it opens up a slot. If anyone thinks the synod leaders care about the individual congregations...think again. I asked a prominent Concordia St. Louis professor about the "shortage" situation. He said, "I don't know and I don't care."
The adiaphora excuse only shows the apostates have not opened the Book of Concord for any reason. Or they simply despise the Confessions.
Formula of Concord - SD X:
10] We believe, teach, and confess also that at the time of confession [when a confession of the heavenly truth is required], when the enemies of God's Word desire to suppress the pure doctrine of the holy Gospel, the entire congregation of God, yea, every Christian, but especially the ministers of the Word, as the leaders of the congregation of God [as those whom God has appointed to rule His Church], are bound by God's Word to confess freely and openly the [godly] doctrine, and what belongs to the whole of [pure] religion, not only in words, but also in works and with deeds; and that then, in this case, even in such [things truly and of themselves] adiaphora, they must not yield to the adversaries, or permit these [adiaphora] to be forced upon them by their enemies, whether by violence or cunning, to the detriment of the true worship of God and the introduction and sanction of idolatry. 11] For it is written, Gal. 5:1: Stand fast, therefore, in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not again entangled in the yoke of bondage. Also Gal. 2:4f : And that because of false brethren unawares brought in, who came in privily to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might bring us into bondage; to whom we gave place by subjection, no, not for an hour, that the truth of the Gospel might continue with you. 12] [Now it is manifest that in that place Paul speaks concerning circumcision, which at that time had become an adiaphoron (1 Cor. 7:18f.), and which at other occasions was observed by Paul (however, with Christian and spiritual freedom, Acts 16:3). But when the false apostles urged circumcision for establishing their false doctrine, (that the works of the Law were necessary for righteousness and salvation,) and misused it for confirming their error in the minds of men, Paul says that he would not yield even for an hour, in order that the truth of the Gospel might continue unimpaired.]
I do not know where this reader worships, but the adiaphora argument was used constantly to excuse WELS chasing after the Evangelicals and Pentecostals. Visit any Assemblies of God congregation and you will find all the key ingredients of a Mark and Avoid Jeske church:
- Praise band.
- Stage - not a chancel. A table maybe, no real altar.
- No pulpit.
- Coaching sessions, no sermon.
- Hide the sacraments.
- Screens here, there, everywhere.
- Selling coffee - supposedly gourmet. Ha.
- Parking valet. No, I am not kidding.
- Digital giving, such as having an ATM in the narthex.
- Clergy attire confused with going to a picnic.
Notice that the favorite motto of the Jeske circle - A Changeless Christ in a Changing World - is also employed by the apostate American Lutheran Publicity Bureau. It is the name of their history book about how they bravely abandoned Lutheran doctrine. So, is that a liberal thing? Yes, the motto is a liberal thing.
The other argument used by WELS is - "Perhaps we should not exercise our liberty, because that might harm those of you with a weak faith." A smirk would follow. There is no use citing the red section of Article X above, because that has as much meaning to them as Egyptian Book of the Dead in its original language.
Besides all that, Eastern Orthodoxy is long on ceremony, short on doctrinal clarity. The poor abused students of Concordia, Ft. Wayne graduate with two great loves - Eastern Orthodoxy and UOJ. UOJ paves the path to Eastern Orthodoxy, Roman Catholicism, Church Growthism, and ultimately atheism. I know two WELS pastors who espoused Church Growth and UOJ only to become atheists - loud and proud - as their confused thoughts led them away from the Word.
The WELS-LCMS-ELS leaders, yea even the CLC (sic) have facilitated this loss of doctrine for the last 40 years plus.
The only WELS excommunication of a pastor for doctrinal reasons was DP Buchholz, SP Schroeder, and their DP allies extending the Left Foot of Fellowship to someone who defended Justification by Faith, the Chief Article of Christianity. How dare he?
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