The Lord's Supper in the Theology of Martin Chemnitz Bjarne - Logia

The Sacramental Union |
ine meaning. I give my assent to this understanding after diligently
considering the arguments of both sides” (Ex. 2, 222).
66 But the Sacramentarians, in rejecting the Roman aberrations with
regard to the consecration (Ex 2, 224), had fallen into the error of depotentiating
(removing the efficacy of) the Verba by changing their
meaning and disregarding the fact that Christ’s “This do” is included
in the Words of Institution as given to His church. With regard to
these, Chemnitz notes that some “rejected the Papistical consecration
in such a way that they imagined the Lord’s Supper could be
celebrated without the Words of Institution” (Ex 2, 225). Chemnitz
makes his position clear with the curt answer, “This is manifestly
false” (Ex 2, 225). He summarizes from the Scripture and also the
Church Fathers what is the doctrine of the true church with regard to
the consecration. This will be examined in detail in the next chapter,
since in view of the widespread Sacramentarian error, even within
the church of the Augsburg Confession, it was necessary for Chemnitz
to treat exhaustively the question of what is the Real Presence
according to the Words of Christ. He follows this procedure in his
work specifically directed against the Sacramentarians, The Lord’s
Supper. With regard to the Roman Church and this problem he is
content merely to make a general reference to this work against the
Sacramentarians (Ex 2, 223; 327).
67 If there had been no controversy in the church regarding the Real
Presence, Chemnitz would have been content to stop with Luther’s
definition of the Lord’s Supper in the Small Catechism. In his
Enchiridion written for the periodic examination by the superintendents
of the pastors in Brunswick, 13 he begins the examination of the
Sacrament with just that definition, “What is the Lord’s Supper or
the Sacrament of the Altar?” “It is the true bodv and true blood of
our Lord Jesus Christ under the bread and the wine for us Christians
to eat and to drink” (MWS, 120). But after stating that the essential
parts of the Sacrament are “Word and element,” he in a practical vein
adds that “these must be rightly explained” (MWS, 120).
68 The real heart of the question at issue in the controversy is, “What
is present in the Lord’s Supper, distributed and received orally by the
communicants?” (LS 38). There is, of course, also the second point
which must be treated later, “For what purpose and use did Christ
in His Supper distribute those elements to be received by the com-