AG8c: Evangelical aspect to Prayer; against Pietism (Prayer III)

      This continues from Part AG8b (Table of Contents in Part AG1a) in a series presenting Walther's essays to the Western District that supported his theme "That Only Through the Doctrine of the Lutheran Church is All Glory Given to God Alone". — This third and final part focuses on the teaching that prayer is to focus on "God's command and promise", and be offered in Jesus' name. — From pp. 54-71 of the convention report:

Notable Quotes:

54: Thesis III: "Our church teaches that only prayer based solely on God's command and promise, and is offered in the name of Jesus, is pleasing to God"

57: "The dogmatists of the 17th century mostly treated the doctrine of prayer under the locus of the law". [Walther counters this by reducing the "legal aspect", emphasizing the evangelical aspect.]

59: "Therefore, everyone, whatever he has to ask for, should always come before God with obedience to this commandment."

60: "Matthew 7:7-8: 'Ask, and it shall be given you…'"

61-62: Luther on Moses's silent "cry", or prayer "which fills heaven and earth".

62: Thesis IV: "prayer is neither a meritorious work nor a means of grace, but an exercise of faith"

62: "the Reformed sects call prayer a means of grace"…To call prayer a means of grace does indeed have some appearance of truth"

64: "the sects actually teach that Christ has only earned us the opportunity to obtain God's grace through our prayer [as a means of grace]"

64: "…the Methodist answers him, 'Now you must pray and struggle, and we will pray with you and for you until the feeling of peace with God blesses your heart.'" [We see why Lutherans cannot pray with the sects.]

70-71: Pietism explained!

71: "Our church teaches us that when we ask for forgiveness, we already have it.…not to obtain grace…[but] to obtain the gifts of grace"

      Now I present my English translation of the full complete essay. It includes missing portions restored, all emphasized wording retained, wording sometimes closer to Walther's, and hyperlinks for reference and navigation:

Download text file with no highlights here; German text file here.

For further reading, Franz Pieper has a section on Prayer in his Christian Dogmatics, III, 76-84, Christliche Dogmatik III, 94-103. The modern LC-MS dogmatics, Confessing the Gospel, has a short section in Vol. 2, pp. 1080-1083. — In the next Part AG9…