Where this is most frustrating and maddening is how everything is expected of or gets judged on the basis of the big footprint. So in Rome it is as if there is only the Pope and the Vatican or, for us Missourians, there is only St. Louis and our elected SP. Of course these are important but they are not everything. I finally have had to give up on the illusion that I will find that perfect jurisdiction on the larger scale. You will not find it in Rome or in Constantinople or in St. Louis or anywhere else. But you do see it more nearly and clearly in the Sunday morning gathering. This is not congregationalism but the essential truth of catholicity. While we seem to stretch catholicity in search of the biggest expression of its wholeness, we end up disdaining the local expression of it. You see that catholicity in the marks of the Church, the Word and the Sacraments and the ministry/priesthood. That is where most of us meet Church and not on the seemingly grander scale of a basilica or cathedral or a bishop's throne. Yes, the large version is important and wonderful but it does not replace nor make the local expression of the Church any less important or wonderful.
I have come to see that it is not about some GIRM or bishop or rule making body enforcing that which defines us but the local expression striving to be all that we confess. That is my problem. So often and too often the local group has lost sight of its own catholicity, willing to trade it all off for better numbers or treating the Church as if she were a social group or program instead of the Body of Christ. The worship problem in Rome and in Missouri is not about enforcing more rules but about local expressions of the Church having lost their identity and reaching vainly into business or social models in search of an identity to replace what they have lost. People and pastors who do stupid stuff on Sunday morning are not trying to be the Church but trying to win friends and influence people or meet people on the therapeutic level they have come to presume is the authentic version of the Church. How foolish we are! We are willing to trade the God who tabernacles among us in the Word that delivers what it says and the Sacraments that bestow what they sign for relevance or entertainment or feelings. That is not a problem of rules or rule enforcers but of a people who have lost sight of who God is and who they are. It is a problem of leaders who are wolves in sheeps' clothing, betraying the promise of eternity for a moment in the spotlight. It is not that the sights have been set too high but too low and, in the end, having lost what is eternal for what is only momentary.
The solution will not come from Rome or St. Louis or some other address. Everyone seems to be looking for the main office to fix things but they won't and they can't. Catholicity on the larger level exists only because it is there on the local level. I once despaired that one parish at a time was not efficient or effective enough but I have learned that it is the only way. The only honest measure of the Church is Sunday morning where the shepherd serves the sheep with the gifts of the Good Shepherd. Remember when the Army had as its slogan Be All that You Can Be? Perhaps our slogan for the Church ought to say Be Who You Are. The main office can never be the refuge that the local assembly of those whom the Spirit calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies is and always will be. It is nice if you can find it but the real catholicity that matters is always local. I wonder if this is not what the Augustana was trying to say in different words and what Missouri has struggled to say with its own confused expression of Church. It is not that the congregation is the only Church or any real form of congregationalism but the local gathering with all of its tangible concreteness, formed by Christ for Christ, and possessing the fullness of the Church but not alone.
Yes, I am probably rambling but that is the meanderings of today.
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I hold the personal point of view that most believers in Christ are aware of the flaws of the church, and want no part of the politics or contentions which arise on a regular basis. However, most of us will hold to the importance of the church, as our fellowship and worship are tied to our relationship to Christ. The Lord does not want His followers to be unmoored and floating alone in the sea of life apart from His church. Of course, it must be a faithful church, but one will never find a perfect church. It is the viewpoint we advance that frames our state of mind about Christ, His church, His people. We need the church. We need the fellowship and worship, and hymns to brighten lives in which struggle and sorrow often prevail. The church is part of our whole identity as Christians. Christ Himself created it. We need the sacraments, and the means of grace, and the fellowship of believers, and sermons, and teaching, and reminders of the importance of faith, and of perseverance with the saints. Let me tell you a story. For a period of about two years, after my retirement from a civil service career, I worked at the Long Island National Cemetery in Farmingdale, NY. I was one of the cemetery representatives who met the funeral directors at the gates, and led them to the assigned shelters for interment services prior to burials. One time I arrived earlier as the casket of a deceased veteran’s spouse was moved into a commital shelter. One of the grave diggers was nearby. Only the funeral director was with us, standing near his vehicle on the side of the road. The grounds worker, an African American man who had worked at the cemetery for a few years, stood alone at one end of the casket, while I stood at the other end. No one else was present, as this was a funeral where nobody showed up to give their respects. It was an unaccompanied service. Some poor souls leave this world scarcely noticed, with neither friends nor family. We perceived that this elderly deceased woman died in a nursing home. It was common to see this from time to time in a cemetery. The worker placed his hand on the casket gently, and said, “”In my Father’s house are many mansions. If it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. I will come again and receive you to myself, that where I am you may be also.” I was deeply moved, as he quoted John 14 verbatim. Later that day, this man would be part of the crew that lowered this woman in a plain wood casket into the cool, damp earth. Those events were usually quiet, except for the sounds of the shovels and the creeking sound of the straps as the casket was being lowered. Perhaps, the church has problems, but so do people. Sometimes we forget. Christ came for people. His church needs to remember that and act accordingly. What the church does has much to do with salvation, eternal life and death. Soli Deo Gloria.
Such frustration from some erring Missourians calling the Missouri Synod “Church” could easily be relieved by having these erring Missourians read what J.T. Mueller wrote in his _Christian Dogmatics_ (pp. 542-3; https://archive.org/details/Mueller/page/542/mode/2up):
“Thus the Augsburg Confession writes (Art. VIII): "The Church properly is the congregation of saints and true believers.” The Apology (Art. VII [VIII], 5): "The Church is not only the fellowship of outward objects and rites, as other governments, but it is originally a fellowship of faith and of the Holy Ghost in hearts." Again (ibid., § 16): "The Church, which is truly the
kingdom of Christ, is properly the congregation of saints….
“Of all errors concerning the Church the foremost is that the Church is an "outward polity" (externa politia, "aeusserliche Polizei,” "Heilsanstalt") "of the good and wicked" (Apology, VII [VIII], 13 ff.), to which persons are joined by their external membership.”
Sadly, those within the Missouri Synod who are secretly diehard episcopists may not be convinced.
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