Iowa Synod

“Note how often faith is mentioned in the epistles. Two of Paul’s epistles – Romans and Galatians – were expressly written to prove that men are justified by faith… The letter to the Hebrews devotes a whole chapter – the 11th – to a panegyric on the heroes of faith… faith is the outstanding doctrine of the New Testament, and therefore should take precedence of a doctrine like election, which is treated more incidentally.

“Modernism accepts just as much of the Bible as suits its subjective conceptions, and then turns around and protests that it believes the Bible. This is certainly not accurate. It ought to say that it accepts such parts of the Bible as agree with its own ideas, and rejects the rest.

“We have certainly great reason to be wide awake and watchful, if we would preserve the inheritance of the Lutheran Church Reformation. Strong are the delusions and temptations of these latter days, and you children and youthful Christians will doubtless see still more perilous times for the Church of Jesus Christ before you have grown old.

How To Understand Scripture “The sin of man not seldom works as a barrier, obscuring what is clear per se. That is the reason why we mentioned also progress in sanctification as one means that might accelerate the process.

The Marks of Unionism 1 A difference in doctrine which hitherto has been regarded as divisive, is suddenly made to lose its divisive significance. 2 Differences in doctrine are made to lose their divisive significance with a view to uniting hitherto separate churches.

“One of the areas in which the Reformer has been repeatedly misrepresented has to do with the relationship of the Church with the Jewish people, frequent attempts being made to link him with modern anti-Semitism.

Justified and saved by grace alone, for Christ’s sake, through faith — that is the kernel of the whole Gospel. This is the fundamental article of the Christian faith and upholds the entire system of Christian doctrine as well as the church itself.

“On November 16, 1881, 12 pastors and teachers, 4 representatives of congregations, and 9 guests met at Blue Island, Illinois to discuss the new doctrine of predestination the Missouri Synod had begun to teach at that time.

“This article [justification by faith] is, as it were, the fortress and chief bulwark of the whole Christian doctrine and religion. If this article remains inviolate, the perversions of the other articles will cease of themselves.

Towards the end of his life, C. F. W. Walther brought forth a teaching of election which many Missouri and other American Lutherans could not reconcile with the Scriptures or the Lutheran Confessions.

“The Christian religion has been called a way of life. It is indeed a way of life, but it is at the same time a way of faith and a way of thought.