From Vicar Camp

October Newsletter
Vicar Camp

Two Examples of Worldly Laws and the

Conscience

God’s blessings to you this month! Last month we
discussed the conscience and talked about the
conscience. For a review: it is, before conversion,
cloudy and accusing or excusing your actions (Rom
2:15); in conversion renewed and made clean so
that it is peaceful and calm (Rom 5:1), and you are
given the Holy Spirit as an aid to your conscience to
convict you of sin and lead you into righteousness
(John 16:8); and it can be sinned against, and
rejected, whereby sinning against the conscience
you drive out the Holy Spirit and faith (Eph. 4:30).
This month, I would like to talk about laws and the
conscience. The government in our nation makes
certain laws and expects us to follow them. Also
our synod, the LCMS, makes certain rulings on
certain issues, usually social issues addressed by
God’s word, but also moral issues that are less
certain for some people. God’s Word tells us to
obey our governing authorities, but Paul says, “we
must obey God rather than man.” So how does the
intentional Christian navigate these issues in his
life? What if you read something in the Word of
God that seems different from what the law says or
the LCMS says about a certain issue? We’ll use
two examples, Government rulings regarding
churches during covid, and LCMS resolutions
regarding church practices.
During covid the government restricted
churches from gathering in large groups, and in
many places, even commanded churches to fully
close their doors. Many Lutheran churches ended
up obeying this ruling initially, but then decided to
continue meeting together. The justification of this
was that in Hebrews, the Word of God tells us not to
neglect to gather together (Heb. 10:25). Our
churches were willing to increase the number of
services, and
restrict number
of attendants, but
they refused to
neglect to gather
together, as the
Word tells us to
do. This is
because the
government is
given by God, that we should obey them, however,
God has not given them total authority, even over
and against His own word. God is the ultimate
authority in every case, and He chooses to delegate
some of His authority to men. However, their
authority can never supersede His own.
Nevertheless, since God’s word does not say how
many people must gather together at a time, where,
when, and how many times a week, then the
government can actually mandate where, when, and
the max capacity of our services. This is because
God has given us our authority for our good, and
commands we obey them. This solution heeds the
word of God in both cases.
In the second case, the LCMS in a 1989
synodical resolution (Res. 3-14, 1989), the synod
says that each church must, using “Christian
judgement,” decide for themselves whether or not
women can read in their church. They explain that
scripture nowhere commands regarding this issue.
So the average Lutheran reading this resolution
would probably determine that it is nothing anyone
should be worried about, and that it is perfectly fine
if a church would choose to have women readers.
However, 1 Corinthians 14:34 says “Let your
women keep silent in the churches, for they are not
permitted to speak; but they are to be submissive as
the law also says.” Also 1 Timothy 2:12 says “And
I do not permit a woman to teach or to have
authority over a man, but to be in silence.” The first
passage is talking not about women singing hymns
or praying, but standing up in the place of an
authority to speak or read. The second passage does
not want a woman to teach. So using your own

Christian judgement, does the word of God say that
women can get up and read the word of God to
someone, which is the authority of the church, and
teaches the Christian something whenever it is
read? So then, even though the synod may say that
women can read scripture, your own understanding
of God’s word shows you something conflicting.
Do you just say with Synod that it’s perfectly okay?
Or do you go with your conscience which convicts
you according to the Word of God?
Next month, we’ll talk about some general
principles. In regard to conscience and worldly
laws.