God's Word on Lawsuits 

By Rev. Jon Coyne

It is with deep sadness I share with you that Jesus First has confirmed the existence of a petition to intervene in the lawsuit that was settled by the Board of Directors in its May meeting. We have posted a letter sent from the Board members who have filed this intervention. This letter was sent to other Board members, but forwarded in an e-mail by former LCMS pastor, Jack Cascione. In the letter, these four Board members try to explain their reasons for filing the intervention.

God’s Word speaks to us about lawsuits between Christians in St. Paul ’s first letter to the people of Corinth . In the sixth chapter, verse 1 Paul writes, “If any of you has a dispute with another, dare he take it before the ungodly for judgment instead of before the saints?” Later, in verse 7 Paul continues, “The very fact that you have lawsuits among you means that you have been completely defeated already. Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be cheated? Instead, you yourselves cheat and do wrong, and you do this to your brothers.” The LCMS Commission on Theology and Church Relations (CTCR) echoed this strong statement from God’s Word in a 1991 document writing, “The motive for taking legal action is more crucial than the action itself. Action taken by one Christian against  another, which has at its root motivations of greed, anger, revenge, the desire to strictly defend one’s own rights, or similar causes which are incompatible with the Christian faith is always wrong.” The same report states, “Every dispute which occurs among Christians, even the smallest dispute, includes aspects that are spiritual in nature. The secular law and the secular court, which are established on the basis of the wisdom of the world, are not in a position to judge the fundamental spiritual issues which are always involved.” Finally, CFW Walther, in his 1848 address to the Synod states that the form of church government, “is an inalienable part of their Christian liberty and that Christians as members of the church are subject to no power in the world except the clear Word of the living God.”

In contrast to the clear statements of the Bible, the CTCR, and CFW Walther, we have the following statement from the four Board members: “Over a period of years, we four, and many other thoughtful pastors and members of the Church have been troubled by efforts to relocate power within the corporate structure of LCMS.” Setting aside for a moment the question of veracity, their statement is clear – the lawsuit and the recent intervention are about “power within the corporate structure of LCMS”.

These four Board members continue, “In our view, concern and uncertainty over the power of the CCM had lingered too long.” The truth is the CCM has no power other than to interpret the Bylaws, Constitution, and resolutions of the LCMS. In other words, the CCM communicates the collective will of the LCMS. The collective will, or governance of the LCMS is beneath the Word of God, from which all power and authority has been derived. The collective will or governance of the LCMS,  consistent with God’s Word in 1 Corinthians 6, is that Christians don’t seek secular courts to decide church matters, but rather to use our dispute resolution process. 

My dear brothers and sisters in Christ, this conflict is about the Bible and the Lutheran Confessions. In the Gospel of St. John, Jesus says, “By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” This continuing unbiblical lawsuit makes our witness to the world one of legal maneuvering for power and wrangling over the laws of our secular government rather than the Word of God. We have been sent out to proclaim to all people that in Christ we are a new creation, in Christ we can love one another as brothers and sisters, in Christ we are free from sin and the bondage of slavery and the law. How sad is the day when we turn to the civil courts in an effort to preserve “power” in one form or another, for one group or another, when the only source of power is the Word of God? What is our witness to the world – one of love, or one of the Law? Brothers and sisters in Christ, over the past years many people have tried to say that the real battle in the LCMS is between conservatives and liberals, or between confessionals and non-confessionals. This lawsuit and the impending intervention show us the truth - this has always been about power. We are all to be conservatives in that we all wish to preserve the truth of the Bible and clearly confess that the Scriptures are the inspired Word of God. We are all to be liberal with God’s love and mercy which has been poured out through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. We are all to be confessional – God’s people who have subscribed to the confessions as an accurate statement of the doctrines of the church, expressed in the Holy Bible. This conflict is about the Gospel. Our witness to the world of a God who has saved us from sin and freed us to live as brothers and sisters in Christ is compromised when we publicly turn to the secular courts to rule on disputes over power. It is time for all LCMS people to confess as one the message of the Bible and the confessions as we stand against those who would compromise the message of the Gospel for the message of the secular law.