Three stories beginning on page one refer to Stella Wuerffel’s historical-romantic novel Two Rivers To Freedom.
The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod will be commemorating the 200th anniversary of its key founder, first president and chief theologian, C.F.W. Walther, during 2011. “What Would Walther Do?”, may be the theme of this year’s Walther Conference which will hopefully be held at Concordia Seminary, St. Louis.
The LCMS’s Concordia Publishing House is inviting essays on Walther to be prepared for a church-wide contest. The CN editor may submit one on “What Would Walther Do Today If He Were President of the LCMS.” It will not gain many points from LCMS and CPH bureaucrats. It may be easier, less time consuming and more economical for CPH simply to reprint “C.F.W. Walther: The American Luther Essays in Commemoration of the 100th Anniversary of Carl Walther’s Death” from the Walther Press. It has excellent essays on Walther by top confessional Lutheran scholars. It is available from CN for $9.99.
CN knows of no better project to bring the scriptural message of Walther and the Saxon fathers to both young and old, pastors and laymen, men and women, boys and girls than making a movie out of Two Rivers To Freedom.
This year the editor and his wife watched, as their regular weekly 45 minute “date”, on DVD the Laura Ingalls Little House On the Prairie series. During CN’s early years we sold hundreds of copies of this series at just a little above cost. The editor and his wife read them to their children on their series of tenting tours through the U.S. and Canada. If the LCMS has 4.3 million dollars to spend on a convention, it should have the resources to produce a top quality two hour movie or entire series on Two Rivers To Freedom. It would be of tremendous interest not only to members of the LCMS, but all patriotic freedom loving Americans, all Bible believing Christians, all who champion the rights of laymen and congregations and oppose the episcopacy championed by Romanizers. Comments Walther made at his famous Fourth of July speech and in his Communism and Socialism could be included. It would show freedom loving Americans that no American church body walked in the steps of America’s great champions of liberty more closely than the founders of the LCMS.
Last year at the 500th birthday of John Calvin many of the Reformed said that John Calvin was “The Greatest of the Protestant Reformers” and that Calvin was “The Virtual Founder of America.” Christian News (July 13, 2009) responded with an editorial titled “Luther Not Calvin, the Champion of Real Freedom.” It said in part: “The CN editor has opposed parts of Calvin’s theology and championed Luther’s theology, particularly his views on freedom, for more than 50 years. Reprinted here is what the editor wrote as a 24 year old student in a master’s thesis on ‘The Political and Economic Thought of Walter A. Maier.’” It is chapter XIII in Walter Maier Still Speaks – Missouri and the World Should Listen, pp. 180-249.
There are numerous events in Two Rivers To Freedom which would fascinate both young and old. Some of the magnificent homes and churches in Dresden when the Saxons left could be shown. Most immigrants came to the U.S. for economic and political reasons. The Saxons more than any others came primarily for religious freedom (Note the photos on pp. 8 and 9). Most were not poor. There could be scenes from Dresden, the Elbe River, Wittenberg, where some of the Saxons got off their river boats for a short period. Storms at sea with three masted sailing ships could be computer generated. The editor has spoken with a “sailor” who regularly participates in sailing journeys as a hobby. One of these ships could be used to film scenes in Two Rivers to Freedom which took place during the long voyage to America. Wuerffel mentions several funerals at sea. Such a funeral could be shown presenting the kind of Christ centered funeral sermon which were preached and hymns that were sung. The Saxon funerals would show Americans how true Lutherans conduct a funeral.
There are several fascinating romances mentioned in Two Rivers To Freedom. A movie on Two Rivers To Freedom could be used to teach youth that all sex outside of marriage is sinful. One of the weddings mentioned in Two Rivers To Freedom could be shown as a pattern for youth to follow today. The scene when two youthful lovers fall into a deep cistern and their comments as they are saved would add great humor. There could be a scene of the slave market the Saxon visited, “purchasing” a slave to get him freedom, and the wedding of former slaves where Two Rivers To Freedom has Walther preaching.
There should be scenes of the Saxon laymen discussing the rights of laymen as they formulate a constitution. C.F.W. Walther’s debate with Marbach where Walther champions congregationalism and showed the Saxons that they were a church even though they had to depose their bishop involved in immorality. Wuerffel clearly recognizes that the Stephanites and pro-Loehe anti-Walther Romanizers in the LCMS are climbing up the wrong tree. Her presentation of the haughty Bishop Stephan shows what he was like. She asked for the evidence a Stephan descendant and defender said he had to show that Stephan was innocent. He never came up with the evidence. Stephan preached some great sermons. But his womanizing and hierarchical Episcopal views should be totally rejected as Wuerffel shows the Saxon fathers doing. Note the article in this issue on the efforts now being made in the LCMS by Romanizers and others to rehabilitate Stephan and degrade Walther and his championing congregationalism.
The Little House on the Prairie series has fascinated America. Unfortunately, the Pastor Alden in the series preaches little Law and Gospel. At times universalism, which has taken over all major denominations today, is promoted. Divine Services shown in a movie based on Two Rivers to Freedom could present Law and Gospel and show that Jesus Christ is the only way to heaven. What Wuerffel writes about children learning and singing solid Lutheran hymns could be presented to teach children today what can be done instead of all these rather meaningless kiddy songs.
One verse of America the Beautiful says: “O Beautiful for Pilgrim’s Feet, Whose Stern Impassioned Stress, A thoroughfare for Freedom Beat, across the Wilderness, America, America, God Meant Thine Every Flaw, Confirm the Soul in Self-control, the Liberty in Law.” The pilgrims may not have gotten much beyond the East Coast. A movie on Two Rivers To Freedom could show what this great patriotic song says about the pilgrims is true about the Saxons. They championed real freedom and liberty under law. August Suelflow concludes his preface: “The two rivers brought freedom, but the water of life gave them life everlasting.” What a great theme to weave into a movie or even an entire series available on DVD. Is there a producer in the LCMS like Michael Landon, the producer of Little House on the Prairie?
Read Stella Wuerffel’s Two Rivers To Freedom and join CN’s campaign to get the LCMS to make a movie or an entire series on the book during the Walther year. ($28.95 while supply lasts).
Thursday, August 26, 2010
Thursday, August 19, 2010
On The Silence Of "Respectable" Conservative
ON THE SILENCE OF “RESPECTABLE” CONSERVATIVES
Why Did Pastor Otten File Charges of False Doctrine vs. Dr. Matthew Becker?
Why Did Pastor Otten File Charges of False Doctrine vs. Dr. Matthew Becker?
“You should have let some more respectable conservatives file charges of false doctrine vs. Matthew Becker for promoting evolution and woman pastors. You are too controversial” CN has been told.
The long record shows that very few of the “respectable” conservatives, the organized conservatives, have ever filed formal charges of false doctrine.
During the 1950’s after many hours of discussion with liberal students at Concordia Seminary during the course of several years, students Kurt Marquart and Herman Otten took the lead in submitting a document to Concordia Seminary St. Louis President Alfred Fuerbringer charging several students with false doctrine. The liberal students were reflecting what they had been taught by liberal professors. The document is in Concordia Seminary, St. Louis vs. Otten Case Book of Documentation arranged by Kurt Marquart.” While there were older conservative students at the seminary, such as Ralph Bohlmann, who became President of the seminary and the LCMS, and his roommate Larry Burgdorf, who became head of the Schwann Foundation, none of them actually filed formal charges of false doctrine. Marquart and Otten would have willingly stepped aside to let older students take the lead in the battle vs. the destructive Biblical higher criticism, denial of the historicity of Genesis and support of evolution being promoted at the seminary. Most conservatives wanted to make certain they would be certified by the seminary and remained silent. Times haven’t changed when it comes to filing charges of false doctrine.
Through the years very few of the conservatives in the LCMS, even those praised as the great heroes of the faith, ever filed charges of false doctrine.
No evolutionist and supporter of the ordination of women on the LCMS clergy roster has ever been removed. Hundreds of hours have been spent in discussion, all sorts of meetings have been held, numerous fine resolutions have been adopted by the LCMS opposing evolution and the ordination of women, yet year after year the names of the evolutionists and supporters of the ordination of women remain on the LCMS clergy roster. During the first 100 years of the LCMS there were no supporters of evolution or women pastors on the LCMS clergy roster. Yet when evolutionists on the LCMS clergy roster began surfacing some 50 years ago none have been removed from the LCMS despite all the conservatives elected to key positions in the LCMS. Once elected president of the LCMS, far too often the new president argues that since he is president “of all the people” there must be room for the theological position of “all the people.”
Now we shall see if under the new LCMS Praesidium evolutionists and supporters of the ordination of women are finally removed from the LCMS.
CN waited for more than 8 months after A Daystar Reader edited by Matthew Becker appeared before filing charges of false doctrine vs. Becker. CN knows of no organized conservatives who even complained about the false doctrine in A Daystar Reader mentioned a good number of times in CN. CN invited the various organized conservative groups in the LCMS, the pro-Loehe anti-Walther Romanizers in the LCMS, and others to file charges. None did. Therefore the CN editor as the pastor of an LCMS congregation did.
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Will the LCMS Finally Take a Stand vs. Evolutionists and Supporters of Women's Ordination
“Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod Failed a Big Test” is the title of a July 28 Christian Newswire story in this issue (p. 15).
The August 2 CN noted that the reaffirmation of resolution 3-09 of the 1973 LCMS convention may have been the most significant action taken at the convention. Now let’s see how the “40 of 2010”, Jesus First and Daystar respond to the letters published in the August 2 CN which were sent to them for their reaction. Will the “40 of 2010”, Jesus First, and Daystar come to the defense of Matthew Becker, “the intellectual leader” of the new left in the LCMS, if he is removed as the liberals came to John Tietjen’s defense in 1974? Note what CN said in “Wanted Men of Integrity, Both Liberals and Conservatives” in the August 2 CN.
Becker has long boldly championed evolution and the ordination of women. This issue includes a letter CN sent to Rev. Paul Linnemann, president of the LCMS’s Northwest District and Becker’s immediate ecclesiastical supervisor. If he continues to defend Becker as Becker’s ecclesiastical supervisors did during the Kieschnick administration, then charges will have to be filed against him. This is what the editor said he would do if the ecclesiastical supervisor of Dr. Paul Bretscher, also of Valparaiso, Indiana where Becker now teaches, would take no action vs. Bretscher.
The editor filed these charges vs. Bretscher as the pastor of a Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod congregation just as he filed the charges vs. Becker published in the August 2 CN. CN had been protesting vs. Bretscher’s false doctrine for almost 30 years. In 1992 Bretscher sent a 13 page pamphlet to all LCMS congregations titled “Christian News and Me.” Bretscher, like Becker, denied the inerrancy of the Bible, supported evolution and promoted critical notions of the Bible which CN said would lead to a denial of the deity of Christ. In 2001 he published “Christianity’s Unknown Gospel,” in which he clearly denied the deity of Christ. LCMS officials remained silent. However, when CN said CN would file charges vs. Bretscher’s ecclesiastical supervisor and those who defended Rev. Theodore Strelow, author of the preface of Bretscher’s Christianity’s Unknown Gospel, Strelow then left the LCMS and Bretscher was finally removed after CN’s decades long battle vs. him.
This was not the first time CN registered concern about the teaching of evolution at Valparaiso. An essay by Carl Krekeler, who is on the LCMS clergy roster, is published in the online Daystar Journal. Becker’s Daystar group defends Krekeler. Krekeler, who formerly taught at Valparaiso University, is the author, together with William Bloom of Valparaiso of General Biology, a biology textbook used at Valparaiso University. Krekeler and Bloom write: “There can be no denying the fact that there is evidence to support the hypothesis that man evolved physically, from prehuman ancestors” (457).
Commenting on Darwin, the LCMS churchmen wrote that “his general interpretation of man’s relationships seems to have been basically correct.” The Valparaiso professors supported the hypothesis that “man was evolved mentally also from prehuman ancestors” (457). CN photographed 4 pages from General Biology in the August 26, 1963 Lutheran News. They are in Missouri Today, a special 64 page issue of CN sent to all delegates to the LCMS’s 1969 convention to show them that LCMS President Oliver Harms was protecting liberals and evolutionists, opposing a heresy trial or action vs. the evolutionists and liberals.
When CN expressed concern about evolution at Valparaiso some 50 years ago, Valparaiso University President O.P. Kretzmann invited the editor to visit him. The editor accepted the invitation and took Kurt Marquart, Ken Miller, and Walter Otten with him. Kretzmann eventually admitted that evolution was being taught as fact at Valparaiso University. John C. Baur, who served as Valparaiso University’s acting president for its first ten years and helped to get it accredited, was a member of the editor’s congregation for his last years when he was a regular writer for Christian News. This former VU acting president refused to continue supporting Valparaiso because it was promoting evolution as fact and denied the inerrancy of the Bible, exactly what Becker now does. During the entire history of the LCMS no one has been removed from the LCMS clergy roster for promoting evolution or the ordination of women. The LCMS’s Council of Presidents even appointed an outspoken evolutionist to the LCMS’s CTCR.
Now it remains to be seen if the LCMS’s new administration sees to it that action is finally taken against the outspoken “intellectual leader” of the new left in the LCMS. Jacob Preus, who ran as a conservative against the moderate Oliver Harms, who took no action vs. evolutionists and liberals in the LCMS, changed after he was elected. True, a few district presidents were removed for violating a human by-law but no evolutionists and liberals were removed for denying God’s Word. Preus remained a church politician and became a typical church bureaucrat. When CN refused to obey his order to cease publication, he tried to destroy CN financially. He had the big money on his side. He wanted to control the press.
Shortly after Preus’s election in 1969, Preus, attorney Glen Peglau and the CN editor, several times discussed ways of removing Richard John Neuhaus from the LCMS. Neuhaus denied the inerrancy of the Bible, the scriptural doctrine of justification alone, promoted evolution and was a universalist who said no one was in Hell. The editor filed a fully documented formal statement of charges of false doctrine vs. Neuhaus. It was about 30 pages. It quoted directly from some of Neuhaus’s many writings. Such Neuhaus defenders as Paul McCain and contributors to the ALPB and John the Steadfast blogs appear to be almost totally ignorant of the false doctrine promoted by evolutionist and liberal Father Neuhaus who joined the Roman Catholic Church. During Neuhaus’s student days CN predicted that Neuhaus and other followers of Arthur Carl Piepkorn, who rejected the inerrancy of the Bible, the historicity of Genesis, and opened the door to evolution, would join the Roman Catholic Church.
It would have done no good to file charges vs. Becker during the Kieschnick – Diekelman administration. When the CN editor testified at an open hearing of an LCMS convention committee considering the teaching of evolution in LCMS colleges, CN offered to place into evidence The God Who Cares by Harold Roellig whose views were defended by Becker. Roellig boldly championed amoeba to man evolution and billions of years. William Diekelman, the convention committee chairman, simply was not interested in any of the evidence CN offered to present.
With the exception of LCMS Vice-President Paul Maier, all the others on the new LCMS’s Praesidium taking office in September affirm the inerrancy of the Bible and oppose evolution. To show CN where he stands on women serving as pastors, Harrison gave CN his book Women Pastors? The Ordination of Women in Biblical Perspective. He edited this collection of essays of Women in Biblical Perspective with John Pless in 2008.
Harrison and Pless rightly insits that “it is becoming increasingly important for faithful Lutherans to be able to articulate why authentic, genuine, historical Lutheramism, because of the teachings of Holy Scripture, does not ordain women to serve as pastors.” (7)
Daniel Preus showed in his great essay “The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod Holiday From History: The 25th Anniversary of the LCMS Walkout” (Christian News, June 14, 1999) that he recognizes the important significance of 3-09. Preus’s essay is in Crisis in Christendom – Seminex Ablaze, pp. 117-124 together with 3-09 and the seminary majority’s Faithful to Our Calling and the Brief Statement and A Statement on Scriptural and Confessional Principles.
Vice-President John Wohlrabe makes his position clear in “Doctrinal Integrity and Outreach Within the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod,” pp. 155-202 of Crisis in Christendom – Seminex Ablaze. He opposes both Jesus First and Daystar for supporting women pastors and theological liberalism.
CN has been regularly publishing a good number of Scott Murray’s excellent columns. He obviously is a great thinker. Hopefully, they persuaded at least two convention delegates regularly receiving CN to vote for Murray who defeated Jesus First candidate David Buegler by two votes. Having Murray as a vice-president rather than Buegler is extremely helpful for confessional Lutheranism if the now LCMS administration is to see to it that evolutionists and supporters of the ordination of women are finally removed from the LCMS clergy roster.
The position of LCMS Vice-President Paul Maier, a candidate of Jesus First and a member of the “40 of 2010” who urged all delegates to vote for Kieschnick rather than Harrison, is documented in “Chapter XXII – Paul Maier” in “Walter A. Maier Still Speaks – Missouri and the World Should Listen” (pp. 357-390). This chapter shows that Maier has long waffled on the inerrancy of the Bible and evolution. He can’t be counted on to work for the removal from the LCMS clergy roster of any promoter of the theology of Seminex, women’s ordination, and evolution like Becker. He wrote that he disagrees with his conservative brother on the inerrancy of the Bible and that the LCMS should not use the term (pp. 374-375). Already in the February 24, 1964 Lutheran News, Walter E. Lammerts, chairman of the Creation Research Society, expressed concerns about Paul Maier’s Test Tube Theology published by CPH (p. 357). The fact that Paul McCain of CPH now regularly praises Maier does not mean Maier is the kind of theologian who will take a stand vs. Becker. McCain also asked David Benke to write for CPH. If Paul Maier defends his membership on the “40 of 1945” by arguing that his father would have signed the “44 of 1950” see “The ‘44’, Maier, Jesus First, the ALPB and Unionism” in Walter Maier Still Speaks, (pp. 362-367). The book is available from CN for $16.95.
The LCMS will soon find out if the new LCMS Praesidium will have the courage to see to it that an outspoken defender of evolution and women pastors is removed from the LCMS and if 3-09 is finally implemented as Kurt Marquart, Paul Burgdorf, Robert Preus and other consistent Lutherans of integrity urged.
The August 2 CN noted that the reaffirmation of resolution 3-09 of the 1973 LCMS convention may have been the most significant action taken at the convention. Now let’s see how the “40 of 2010”, Jesus First and Daystar respond to the letters published in the August 2 CN which were sent to them for their reaction. Will the “40 of 2010”, Jesus First, and Daystar come to the defense of Matthew Becker, “the intellectual leader” of the new left in the LCMS, if he is removed as the liberals came to John Tietjen’s defense in 1974? Note what CN said in “Wanted Men of Integrity, Both Liberals and Conservatives” in the August 2 CN.
Becker has long boldly championed evolution and the ordination of women. This issue includes a letter CN sent to Rev. Paul Linnemann, president of the LCMS’s Northwest District and Becker’s immediate ecclesiastical supervisor. If he continues to defend Becker as Becker’s ecclesiastical supervisors did during the Kieschnick administration, then charges will have to be filed against him. This is what the editor said he would do if the ecclesiastical supervisor of Dr. Paul Bretscher, also of Valparaiso, Indiana where Becker now teaches, would take no action vs. Bretscher.
The editor filed these charges vs. Bretscher as the pastor of a Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod congregation just as he filed the charges vs. Becker published in the August 2 CN. CN had been protesting vs. Bretscher’s false doctrine for almost 30 years. In 1992 Bretscher sent a 13 page pamphlet to all LCMS congregations titled “Christian News and Me.” Bretscher, like Becker, denied the inerrancy of the Bible, supported evolution and promoted critical notions of the Bible which CN said would lead to a denial of the deity of Christ. In 2001 he published “Christianity’s Unknown Gospel,” in which he clearly denied the deity of Christ. LCMS officials remained silent. However, when CN said CN would file charges vs. Bretscher’s ecclesiastical supervisor and those who defended Rev. Theodore Strelow, author of the preface of Bretscher’s Christianity’s Unknown Gospel, Strelow then left the LCMS and Bretscher was finally removed after CN’s decades long battle vs. him.
This was not the first time CN registered concern about the teaching of evolution at Valparaiso. An essay by Carl Krekeler, who is on the LCMS clergy roster, is published in the online Daystar Journal. Becker’s Daystar group defends Krekeler. Krekeler, who formerly taught at Valparaiso University, is the author, together with William Bloom of Valparaiso of General Biology, a biology textbook used at Valparaiso University. Krekeler and Bloom write: “There can be no denying the fact that there is evidence to support the hypothesis that man evolved physically, from prehuman ancestors” (457).
Commenting on Darwin, the LCMS churchmen wrote that “his general interpretation of man’s relationships seems to have been basically correct.” The Valparaiso professors supported the hypothesis that “man was evolved mentally also from prehuman ancestors” (457). CN photographed 4 pages from General Biology in the August 26, 1963 Lutheran News. They are in Missouri Today, a special 64 page issue of CN sent to all delegates to the LCMS’s 1969 convention to show them that LCMS President Oliver Harms was protecting liberals and evolutionists, opposing a heresy trial or action vs. the evolutionists and liberals.
When CN expressed concern about evolution at Valparaiso some 50 years ago, Valparaiso University President O.P. Kretzmann invited the editor to visit him. The editor accepted the invitation and took Kurt Marquart, Ken Miller, and Walter Otten with him. Kretzmann eventually admitted that evolution was being taught as fact at Valparaiso University. John C. Baur, who served as Valparaiso University’s acting president for its first ten years and helped to get it accredited, was a member of the editor’s congregation for his last years when he was a regular writer for Christian News. This former VU acting president refused to continue supporting Valparaiso because it was promoting evolution as fact and denied the inerrancy of the Bible, exactly what Becker now does. During the entire history of the LCMS no one has been removed from the LCMS clergy roster for promoting evolution or the ordination of women. The LCMS’s Council of Presidents even appointed an outspoken evolutionist to the LCMS’s CTCR.
Now it remains to be seen if the LCMS’s new administration sees to it that action is finally taken against the outspoken “intellectual leader” of the new left in the LCMS. Jacob Preus, who ran as a conservative against the moderate Oliver Harms, who took no action vs. evolutionists and liberals in the LCMS, changed after he was elected. True, a few district presidents were removed for violating a human by-law but no evolutionists and liberals were removed for denying God’s Word. Preus remained a church politician and became a typical church bureaucrat. When CN refused to obey his order to cease publication, he tried to destroy CN financially. He had the big money on his side. He wanted to control the press.
Shortly after Preus’s election in 1969, Preus, attorney Glen Peglau and the CN editor, several times discussed ways of removing Richard John Neuhaus from the LCMS. Neuhaus denied the inerrancy of the Bible, the scriptural doctrine of justification alone, promoted evolution and was a universalist who said no one was in Hell. The editor filed a fully documented formal statement of charges of false doctrine vs. Neuhaus. It was about 30 pages. It quoted directly from some of Neuhaus’s many writings. Such Neuhaus defenders as Paul McCain and contributors to the ALPB and John the Steadfast blogs appear to be almost totally ignorant of the false doctrine promoted by evolutionist and liberal Father Neuhaus who joined the Roman Catholic Church. During Neuhaus’s student days CN predicted that Neuhaus and other followers of Arthur Carl Piepkorn, who rejected the inerrancy of the Bible, the historicity of Genesis, and opened the door to evolution, would join the Roman Catholic Church.
It would have done no good to file charges vs. Becker during the Kieschnick – Diekelman administration. When the CN editor testified at an open hearing of an LCMS convention committee considering the teaching of evolution in LCMS colleges, CN offered to place into evidence The God Who Cares by Harold Roellig whose views were defended by Becker. Roellig boldly championed amoeba to man evolution and billions of years. William Diekelman, the convention committee chairman, simply was not interested in any of the evidence CN offered to present.
With the exception of LCMS Vice-President Paul Maier, all the others on the new LCMS’s Praesidium taking office in September affirm the inerrancy of the Bible and oppose evolution. To show CN where he stands on women serving as pastors, Harrison gave CN his book Women Pastors? The Ordination of Women in Biblical Perspective. He edited this collection of essays of Women in Biblical Perspective with John Pless in 2008.
Harrison and Pless rightly insits that “it is becoming increasingly important for faithful Lutherans to be able to articulate why authentic, genuine, historical Lutheramism, because of the teachings of Holy Scripture, does not ordain women to serve as pastors.” (7)
Daniel Preus showed in his great essay “The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod Holiday From History: The 25th Anniversary of the LCMS Walkout” (Christian News, June 14, 1999) that he recognizes the important significance of 3-09. Preus’s essay is in Crisis in Christendom – Seminex Ablaze, pp. 117-124 together with 3-09 and the seminary majority’s Faithful to Our Calling and the Brief Statement and A Statement on Scriptural and Confessional Principles.
Vice-President John Wohlrabe makes his position clear in “Doctrinal Integrity and Outreach Within the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod,” pp. 155-202 of Crisis in Christendom – Seminex Ablaze. He opposes both Jesus First and Daystar for supporting women pastors and theological liberalism.
CN has been regularly publishing a good number of Scott Murray’s excellent columns. He obviously is a great thinker. Hopefully, they persuaded at least two convention delegates regularly receiving CN to vote for Murray who defeated Jesus First candidate David Buegler by two votes. Having Murray as a vice-president rather than Buegler is extremely helpful for confessional Lutheranism if the now LCMS administration is to see to it that evolutionists and supporters of the ordination of women are finally removed from the LCMS clergy roster.
The position of LCMS Vice-President Paul Maier, a candidate of Jesus First and a member of the “40 of 2010” who urged all delegates to vote for Kieschnick rather than Harrison, is documented in “Chapter XXII – Paul Maier” in “Walter A. Maier Still Speaks – Missouri and the World Should Listen” (pp. 357-390). This chapter shows that Maier has long waffled on the inerrancy of the Bible and evolution. He can’t be counted on to work for the removal from the LCMS clergy roster of any promoter of the theology of Seminex, women’s ordination, and evolution like Becker. He wrote that he disagrees with his conservative brother on the inerrancy of the Bible and that the LCMS should not use the term (pp. 374-375). Already in the February 24, 1964 Lutheran News, Walter E. Lammerts, chairman of the Creation Research Society, expressed concerns about Paul Maier’s Test Tube Theology published by CPH (p. 357). The fact that Paul McCain of CPH now regularly praises Maier does not mean Maier is the kind of theologian who will take a stand vs. Becker. McCain also asked David Benke to write for CPH. If Paul Maier defends his membership on the “40 of 1945” by arguing that his father would have signed the “44 of 1950” see “The ‘44’, Maier, Jesus First, the ALPB and Unionism” in Walter Maier Still Speaks, (pp. 362-367). The book is available from CN for $16.95.
The LCMS will soon find out if the new LCMS Praesidium will have the courage to see to it that an outspoken defender of evolution and women pastors is removed from the LCMS and if 3-09 is finally implemented as Kurt Marquart, Paul Burgdorf, Robert Preus and other consistent Lutherans of integrity urged.
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