Preface

The Christian Church has not worked out its teachings by a process of gradual development in the course of time, leading to several historically justified systems of doctrine, among which we Lutherans regard that system contained in our distinctive creeds or confessional writings as preferable to the rest. All that our Confessions teach concerning Christian doctrine every Christian knows and believes, because it is found clearly revealed in the Word of the Prophets and Apostles. And that Word, as it is the means whereby every Christian has been brought to faith, is also the only source from which he draws the truth upon which his faith rests. Biblical truth is God-given truth, and Christian faith is God-given faith. And as God is one, so the truth which He reveals is one, and so the faith which He bestows receives the one truth which He reveals. All Christians do believe in one true God, and they believe what He teaches them in His one true Word. Therefore if all Christians would duly study God’s written Word, truly confess with their lips the faith of their heart, and avoid all human teachings which conflict therewith, all Christians would join in the orthodox confession, that is, in the correct confession of the Biblical truth. The writer prays that this little book may through its use of God’s Word aid some children of God in making a clear and heartfelt confession of the full truth of God’s Word.

W. H. McLaughlin
Minneapolis, Minnesota, 1963