WIC6: "The Open Heaven" (1929 Synod); Walther "remains firm, like steel and diamond"

      This continues from Part WIC5 (Table of Contents in Part WIC1) in a series presenting a new translation of all of Franz Pieper's essays previously translated in the 1933 CPH book What Is Christianity? And Other Essays. — This sixth of six essays completes the series of essays that Prof. J. T. Mueller translated in 1933. It is a fitting essay for the finale, as Christians must always keep their eyes on the hereafter. This is largely a Bible lesson and will place a Christian's faith on solid ground and in… the Open Heaven. 

      I am sorry that Prof. Mueller did not include much of the emphasis of wording as these are critical to get the full power of Pieper's teaching. Again, this is one of the main benefits of my translations over Mueller's. This essay was not printed in the convention report but rather in 3 installments of Lehre und Wehre, vol. 75, pp. 196-201, 225-233, 257-264.

Notable Quotes:

Part I: How was heaven opened?

198: "of this heaven we say from Scripture that it is open to all men.… Yes, heaven is open!"

198: "Of course, heaven was closed to us humans because of the Fall of our first parents."

199: "He also committed Him to take upon Himself the whole guilt of sin that lay upon the human race.… thus opened heaven again completely to all men without exception."

199: "For the apostle does not say: 'God was in Christ, reconciling' half the world or a quarter of the world to himself, but 'the world.'"

200: 2 Cor. 5:19 – "word of reconciliation": "does not refer to the reconciliation that takes place in the heart and conscience of man…[but] the reconciliation by which God reconciled the whole world to himself" [I. e. not subjective reconciliation, but objective reconciliation.] 

200: "He who does not preach heaven open to all men through Christ does not preach the gospel"

201: "everything that the world generally puts under the comprehensive heading of "worldview" is trivial."

201: "As far as reconciliation through Christ is concerned, there is no distinction of race, color, class, culture and unculture, worldly respectability and worldly reproach."

Part II: Unitarians, Calvinists, Romanists and Arminians, American Lutherans want to close the open heaven.

225: "Unitarians openly practice the closure of heaven.…deny that God was in Christ…"

226: Unitarians "invoke Christ … 'In my Father's house are many mansions.'" Answer: "'I am the way and the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father except through me.'  John 14:6"

226: "If [Unitarians] continue to deny the Lord who bought them with his blood, they exclude themselves from the open heaven."

226: Calvinists "teach that Christ has acquired grace and opened heaven for only a part of mankind"

228: "Calvinist Reformed thus take the liberty of simply crossing out Scripture words like these: 'God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself'" [2 Cor. 5:19]

228: "as soon as man is struck by God's law,… he logically counts himself among the eighty percent whom Christ did not purchase from eternal damnation with his blood" [According to Calvinists.]

228-229: "the Calvinist must become Lutheran, that is, believe in God's completely unlimited general grace, if he is not to perish through despair in temptation and agony"

229: "Let us therefore also be careful when recommending Calvinist writings." [Examples: Spurgeon, John MacArthur]

230: Synergists: "The Roman Church places itself before the door of heaven… and demands that those who wish to enter must show a fulfillment of 'the law of God and the commandments of the Church'."

230: The Arminian Reformed [Methodists, Holiness groups, Pentecostals, Mennonites] also stand before the door to heaven…God's grace in Christ is not enough …man must contribute to this" [Some want to distinguish Arminians from Reformed, but Pieper corrects that notion.]

231: "the saddest event in the history of the Church and the world in recent centuries"…within the American Lutheran Church in particular, 'by grace alone' was also fought against and rejected with great seriousness.…taught that conversion and salvation depended on the right conduct of man"

Part III: Against Reformed attacks on Lutheran doctrine

257: "…attested in our Lutheran Confessions, that God has reconciled the whole human world to himself through the vicarious life, suffering and death of his incarnate Son, and that heaven is thereby open to all people without exception. We must teach and confess this truth clearly and tirelessly."

257: "Krummacher wrote an article …entitled: "Why we are not Lutheran, but Reformed.…to propagandize for the Reformed Church against the Lutheran Church in this country""

258: "two things are held up as Lutheran doctrine against the Reformed…unrestricted universal grace, …and unrestricted grace alone"…God's Word teaches both." 

Both Calvinists and synergists are against God's Word that teaches both universal grace and grace alone. This refutes the notion that Arminian/synergists are distinct from the Reformed. Their difference is only superficial, as they both deny God's clear Word. One of the most confusing theological topics is found when asking the Internet "intelligence" whether Arminians are "Reformed" or not. One gets conflicting explanations when exploring this (search "are Arminians Reformed?") on the Internet. The Calvinists and synergists are united in their opposition to Lutheranism, and God's Word.

258: "…the Lutheran Church in its Confessions believes God in his Word"

259: Walther: "He who has not yet learned to hold both — universal grace and grace alone — … has not yet passed the last necessary test of his ability to teach within the Christian Church"

260: Walther "remains firm, like steel and diamond, in his judgment and condemnation of the opposing doctrine that God's grace and mercy are dependent on human good behavior".

261-262: "Every chain, as Dr. Walther used to remind us, is only as strong as its weakest link.… The chain forged by God for our salvation is strong…O pity! — people have come up with the idea of improving the divine chain of grace by inserting human good behavior.

263: "So we should not be lax in spreading the message of the open heaven, but rush out into the world with it, as it were"

      Now I present my full translation of Pieper's 1929 essay. Again all of Pieper's emphasis of wording has been retained, unlike the translation by Prof. Mueller in 1933:

Download file without highlighting >> here <<; German text file here.

      Prof. Mueller chose well in selecting these essays as they cover a broad spectrum of topics and are all edifying for the Christian faith and life. One could even think of this selection as an abbreviated, less technical, version of the 3-volume set of Pieper's Christian Dogmatics.

      But I would like to add one more essay that I feel should have been included in this compendium. It's topic would go along with the above essay on "The Open Heaven", and I am including it as an Appendix to this collection, in Part 7 in the next blog post.