The Church and Her Fellowship, Ministry and Governance (Confessional Lutheran Dogmatics, Vol 9) [Hardcover]

Kurt Marquart (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover
• Publisher: Intl Foundation for Lutheran (June 1990)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0962279196
• ISBN-13: 978-0962279195
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,461,821 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Excellent Book on the Lutheran teaching of Church and Ministry, November 26, 2005

By 

Ross Johnson "Confessional Lutheran" (Alabama) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Church and Her Fellowship, Ministry and Governance (Confessional Lutheran Dogmatics, Vol 9) (Hardcover)

"The Church and Her Fellowship, Ministry and Governance" by Kurt E. Marquart is first rate because it is theologically balanced and extremely clear. Kurt Marquart is an excellent conservative and confessional Lutheran Church Missouri Synod theologian. Marquart does well at staying out of the trappings of Lohe's episcopal view of church government, WELS functional view of the ministry, and the hyper-Waltheran view of church and ministry. This book is foundational for any Lutheran pastor's library. If your pastor does not own this book, do him a favor and buy it for him. I would give this book six stars if I could. Some of the helpful extras are a Scripture Index, Lutheran Confessions Index, Name Index, and Subject Index.

The four main parts of the book are:
1. The Church
2. Church Fellowship
3. The Ministry
4. Church Governance

The chapters in this book are:
1. Sketching the Counters
2. The Church and Christ
3. Four Basic "Models" of Ecclesiology
4. The Church and Her Marks of Identification
5. "One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic"
6. The Nature of Church Fellowship
7. The Basis and Criteria for Church Fellowship
8. The Ecumenical Movement: Charms and Challenges
9. Priesthood and Ministry
10. The One Gospel Ministry [Predigtamt] and Auxiliary Offices
11. Call and Ordination
12. The Two Kingdoms or Two Realms
13. Local Church, Large Church, and Polity
Excursus: "Missouri" and "Wisconsin" on Church and Ministry

This book is recommended for:
1. LC-MS Pastors
2. Lutheran Pastors of other Lutheran Synods
3. Interested Laypeople
4. Non-Lutherans who are interested in the conservative Lutheran viewpoint of the material covered in the book.

Some other books that I would recommend on this subject are:
1. "Church and Ministry: The Role of Church, Pastor, and People from Luther to Walther" by Eugene F. A. Klug.
2. "Church and Ministry" by Dr. C.F.W. Walther.
3. "The True Visible Church" by Dr. C.F.W. Walther.
4. "The Form of a Christian Congregation" by Dr. C.F.W. Walther.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Easily worth the effort and reading, rereading and believing, November 9, 1998

By 

rodboomboom (Dearborn, Michigan United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: The Church and Her Fellowship, Ministry and Governance (Confessional Lutheran Dogmatics, Vol 9) (Hardcover)

I felt in reading this Biblical based book the feeling expressed in Luke 24:32: Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us . . . ? My heart did burn with God's Spirit as I read Prof. Marquart's wonderful dogma on the church and its fellowship. Since fellowship in this era of ecumenism is so widely discussed, this book is vital in the church's consideration of moving to the oneness the Bible admonishes us towards strongly. As Marquart shows, it is Christ's body built and founded on His Word and it will always be! What is disagreed on is what is and is not God's Holy Word. Thus, this unforutnate presupposition is critical to answering the questions this dogma teaches. Marquart eloquently and clearly shows that the Bible puts forth the truth of the pure Gospel and Sacraments of the Lord which deliver the forgiveness of sins for the sake of Christ crucified is the heart and core of the church and its fellowship.

Refutation of this on the basis of Scriptures would be difficult. I haven't seen anything which even addresses this as well.