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Strangers to Sisters - Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary Library: Essays

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The Confessions emphasize that it is the congregation alone<br />

which has the right and power <strong>to</strong> call a man <strong>to</strong> the divine<br />

office, but they nowhere say that it is only the man who is<br />

called <strong>to</strong> serve a local congregation of whom it can be<br />

affirmed that he holds the divinely established ministerial<br />

office. 272<br />

Lillegard quickly pointed out that the <strong>Wisconsin</strong> Synod did not teach that it is a<br />

matter of Christian liberty either <strong>to</strong> found Christian congregations or <strong>to</strong> have Christian<br />

ministers. However, the manner in which Christian congregations organizes or in what<br />

manner the divinely instituted office of the ministry is carried out is a matter of Christian<br />

liberty,<br />

When the <strong>Wisconsin</strong> Synod speaks about “Christian<br />

liberty,” in connection with the establishment of the various<br />

offices in the Church, it does not mean that the office held<br />

by the apostles was established in Christian liberty by the<br />

Church…but it does say that it was a matter of Christian<br />

liberty for the church <strong>to</strong> call one man <strong>to</strong> be a missionary,<br />

another a pas<strong>to</strong>r of a local congregation, another a<br />

supervisor or “bishop” (in the modern sense of the word),<br />

another a theological professor, etc. Churches may combine<br />

or divide these offices as they please and still be following<br />

the Scriptural teaching with regard <strong>to</strong> the public ministry of<br />

the Word…<br />

<strong>Wisconsin</strong> does not say that it is a matter of Christian<br />

liberty whether <strong>to</strong> found Christian churches or not. On the<br />

contrary, it agrees with Missouri…But <strong>Wisconsin</strong> does say<br />

that the manner in which the Christians organized, whether<br />

in small groups such as “the church in the house” referred<br />

<strong>to</strong> in Philemon 2, or in larger groups covering a whole city<br />

(I Corinthians 1,2 etc.), or in what we would call “synods,”<br />

i.e. including all the churches in a larger area in one group<br />

(Acts 9:31; Acts 15:23 “The brethren in Antioch and Syria<br />

and Cilicia”), --this was a matter of Christian liberty. We<br />

hold that on this point <strong>Wisconsin</strong> is right and Missouri<br />

wrong. 273 (Emphasis mine)<br />

272 Lillegard, Church and Ministry, 4.<br />

273 Lillegard, Church and Ministry, 4-5.<br />

146

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