Question from Pastor Name Withheld - "Does the New, 15% Luther's Large Catechism Teach Objective (Faithless) Justification?"

 

Installation of Andrew Preus, Trinity, New Haven, Missouri, 2021. Sam Nafzger is on the far left, back row. Walter Otten is almost on the far right, back row. Andrew is flanked by his brother and his father Rolf, front row. Herman Otten died in 2019, closely tied with the Robert Preus clan but not with the Jack Preus side.

The Scriptures, Luther, and the Book of Concord teach Justification by Faith, the Chief Article of Christianity, but the LCMS and Sam Nafzger do not.

As Nafzger (Harvard PhD) must know, CFW Walther learned Objective (Faithless) Justification from his Pietistic Bishop, Martin Stephan. Walther never deviated from that dogma, lovingly repeated and quoted by the ELS below -

Walther's "make a decision for world absolution" was taken from his syphilitic bishop via Halle University Pietism, a misinterpretation of 1 Timothy 3:16.

Luther's Large Catechism, 2022 (sic) includes an essay from Sam Nafzger, which begins with the typical distorted Objective (Faithless) Justification:

Running through the writings of the sixteenth-century Lutheran confessors is a constant theme: God declares sinners right with Him by His grace alone (sola gratia) through faith alone (sola fide), p. 395.

This is clever double-talk, because LCMS, WELS, ELS, and CLC (sic) are delighted by their OJ agreement. They use ambiguity to cloak their agenda. The OJists love the Walther approach, so they soften the stupidity so the sheep may be slaughtered and scattered.

As WELSians like to say, "The Nafzger quotation ca-a-a-a-a-an be taken the right way."

It only takes a page turn to see Wiley E. Nafzger spring the trap -

After years of struggling with this problem, Luther finally was led to see through his study of Holy Scripture that God's justification of sinners is not a process but rather His declaration that the sins of the world have been forgiven on account of Jesus' substitutionary death on the cross, p. 396.

Nafzger is perfect ELCA, perfect Rambach, perfect Halle Pietism, perfect Stephan - but not Scriptural, not Book of Concord.

Rolf Preus used to declare "raised for our justification" by itself until I repeated Romans 4:24 with 4:25...many times. He seems to have stopped mentioning Justification and Rome too.

Nafzger's problem comes from merging the Atonement of Christ with Justification by Faith, the result of trying to merge Justification by Faith with Calvinism and Pietism, ignoring the Means of Grace and the efficacy of the Word.