The Conservative Reformation and Its Theology - Saint Mary ...

war of Reformation, would have been lost. Hopeless division, anarchy, ruin
and absorption, were the perils from which the Formula of Concord saved
our Church. The loss of Germany would have been the loss of
Lutheranism throughout the world, and with it the loss of Protestantism
itself. Feeling the responsibility of their position, not without consciousness
of the greatness of the work they had done, the authors of the Formula of
Concord humbly, yet joyously, closed it with these solemn words:
"Wherefore, in the presence of Almighty God, and of Christ's whole
Church, both of the living, and of the generations which shall follow us, it
has been our purpose to testify, that of the Articles in Controversy; the
Declaration we have now made, and none other, is in very deed our
doctrine, faith and Confession. In this Confession, by God's grace, we are
ready with fearless hearts to appear and render an account before the
judgment-seat of Jesus Christ. Against this Declaration we will speak
nothing, and write nothing, openly or secretly, but, the Lord helping us,
will remain steadfast in it to the end. In testimony thereof, with mature
deliberation, in the fear of God, and calling upon His name, we have with
our own hands set our names to this Declaration."