To keep it pithy: RIGHT ON!

Pastor McCain,
I’m not looking to have this posted on your blog, but I wasn’t sure how to reach you otherwise.
When you write that you have sometimes been harsh and judgmental, sadly, I must agree that has been the case. And when you ask for forgiveness, I for one am happy to give it, having myself been forgiven for the SAME SIN many times over, not to mention countless others.
As to the substance of your post on sanctification and the lack of it in our (LCMS) preaching, I think that you are very much on to something. Contine to probe and write. This is a very worthwhile subject. Your mind (a God-given gift to the church) would be well employed in this service. Thank you for what you have written thus far.
In Christ,
Daniel
Out

Dear Pastor McCain,
I read your post on sanctification this morning. Well done. I too have been wrestling with this issue for a few years and am quite concerned about the ‘aversion to sanctification’ among many Lutherans. I am convinced that the most pressing theological issue facing Christianity today is the article of justification. In the Lutheran camp, the marginalization of sanctification has seriously threatened a proper understanding of justification, the renewing work of the Spirit, and the soteriological narrative laid out from Creation to Pentecost. In terms of global Christianity, the persistent God question with respect to Islam threatens the heart of our Christian confession: the Word made flesh. As the fourth-century pro-Nicenes understood, to deny or compromise Jn 1:14 is to deny our salvation in Christ alone.

I have noticed this lack of the doctrine of Sanctification too. I learned about the proper distinction from Walther, and how to preach a Gospel sermon, but not how to preach properly the Law. I think Luther called people who preach without sanctification ‘Easter Preachers’. I really starting to get this when I looked through the Sermons from the Concrodia Pulpits of the 30′s through 50′s. How can these guys have been trained with essentially the same books (Law/Gospel, Pieper) and produce sermons that look so different from my own and others, indeed that seem Law heavy. In fact, sometimes they even end on a Law (usually intended sanctification) note.
Honestly I am a bit frightened because I can do the ‘Easter Sermon’, I can properly divide Law FROM Gospel… but I can’t properly preach Sanctification in my sermons, and even Walther seems no help on how to do it.
Any suggestions?

My brothers and sisters in Christ,
Thank you, Pastor McCain and others, for your thoughtful consideration of the issue of preaching sanctification. I too am a pastor who probably should be considered someone who consistently preaches the “Easter sermon” (although we should come up with another term for it; I dislike the idea of giving the word “Easter” any sort of negative connotation).
The difficulty that I’m sure many have is in the practical application. I was never taught how to do so at seminary, and it sounds like none of us have (at least in the last 50 years or so). What does a modern 21st century method of preaching sanctification really look like? When I try to do it, I end up with a couple of generic “let us” statements in the concluding paragraph of my sermon… I’m not really happy with it.
Yours in Christ,
Matthew Christians,
pastor- Bethlehem Lutheran Church, Milan WI
St. John Evangelical Lutheran Church, Edgar WI

Pastor McCain,
I appreciate your post. Many good thoughts here.
You said: I have even heard a pastor excuse sin by saying, “Well, in the kingdom of the left, you just have to sin sometimes, as long as you are trying to accomplish good things.” (end)
Oftentimes, it has seemed that this is just what Uwe Simon-Netto, for example, says on Issues ETC – esp. re: politics. We must “get our hands dirty.” This is the whole Bonhoeffer question, is it not?
I know extreme examples are not what we use to construct our moral theology, but would it have been a bad idea to lie to the Nazis when they come looking for Jews in your house and you have them? It seems to me that sometimes, you are going to sin either way, and the “lesser-of-two-evils” is the way we must go…
Of course, then the danger would be calling more and more things in our lives “extreme situations” in which a “lesser-of-two-evils” approach is warranted.
McCain: That sometimes we sin in this world, is beyond question. But what I’m talking about is when folks excuse sin blithely by tossing off “kingdom of the left/right.”

I would surmise that people aren’t told that the “good” works aren’t things “they” do, but things that God does through them.
“Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” Php 2:12
This keeps the focus on Christ – who as part of the Godhead is doing the good works through us, and refutes the notion that all kinds of deliberate sin and such are covered by “grace.” As this passage from Romans details:
“Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed.” Romans 2:4
While this is specifically in reference to hypocrisy and passing judgment on others for things they’re doing themselves, there’s a number of examples of God’s patience and eventual righteous judgment reflected in other events throughout history. Time after time, God is patient as cities and nations filled the cup of the His wrath, and then He forces them to drink it to the dregs.
Christ said “For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” (Matt 11:30), and the reason is that He’s the one doing all the work. So what more could a person ask for? Why would one want to walk a different path and paddle their own canoe when Christ is doing His work with and through them?
Of course, if someone really wants to live in their old Adam, fill the cup of God’s wrath, and risk drinking it forever after they’ve been judged, that is certainly their choice.

As one who had some concerns over your initial posts I agree with much of what you write here – the antinomian error has always been “well, why don’t we sin so grace may abound!” Of course, Paul deals with that clearly in Romans with “God Forbid!”
I think the rub between justification and sanctification is a simple one. Simply put our sanctification is naturally MOTIVATED by our justification. If there is no attempt or recognition of the rightful place of the law in governing the Christian’s life than its doubtful if one ever understood their need to be justified to begin with.
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McCain: I would prefer to use the language of the Lutheran Confessions which speak this way:
“As soon as the Holy Spirit has begun His work of regeneration and renewal in us through the Word and Holy Sacraments, we can and should cooperate through His power, although still in great weakness. This cooperation does not come from our fleshly natural powers, but from the new powers and gifts that the Holy Spirit has begun in us in conversion. St. Paul clearly and eagerly encourags that “working together with Him, then, we appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain” [2 Cor. 6:1]. This is to be understood in no othe rway than the following: the coverted person does good to such an etend ad as long as God by His Holy Spirit rules, guies, and leads him.” FC SD II:65-66; Concordia, p. 532.
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This is easily seen in Romans. In Chapter 6 Paul calls the Christian to live in accordance with, and in response to, the promise of the Gospel (Baptism). In Rom 7 he recognizes that he fails miserably (as do we) in those attempts but he recognizes the value of the law and rests in the assurance that his salvation is dependent on Christ’s righteousness not his own – which of course – enables him to a degree to try to keep the law or at a minimum at least generates his DESIRE to keep the law.
1 John I think even gives more indication that this is the normal pattern for the Christian.
Simply put, the crux of justification is what are we relying upon for our salvation – Christ or our works. The crux of sanctification is how we are going to respond to being given the gift of Christ – with contempt or gratitude. If the latter than even a meager attempt, and certainly a desire to obey the law will result.
Humility of course will hopefully always demonstrate how woefully short we fall of keeping the law, but, ideally through being continually reminded of the Gospel we’ll keep at it nonetheless knowing our salvation is not our righteousness – and – as a result the outsider we’ll see a gradual and steady general increase in the level of our sanctification until it is brought to its fullest fruition in the age to come.
We should echo Paul in saying that “I do not do what I desire to do”. Certainly, if we desire to do something we are at least going to try – even if we fail.
McCain: I entirely concur!

Pastor McCain,
Much like a previous poster, I wasn’t looking to have this posted as a public comment either. But I do have a question that ties in with the sanctification issue and the teaching of it in our LCMS congregations.
Does the “Purpose Driven Life” material have any place in the LCMS as a means to help people learn how to live a sancitified life? What would be your advice to someone whose church is preparing to go through a “Purpose Driven” campaign?
McCain: I don’t know exactly what the “campaign” you are referring to is, so it’s hard for me to comment too specifically on it. I don’t think “Purpose Driven” has nearly enough Gospel/Christ/Cross focus in it to justify its use in our congregations to teach sanctification [yes, ok, pun intended]. I would suggest you use the opportunity carefully to read the Large Catechism by Dr. Luther and then perhaps, along with it, Johann Gerhard’s Sacred Meditations.

Harold Seinkbeil’s Sanctification: Christ in Action would also be an excellent book for a church to help people learn what is the “Lutheran difference” as it regards sanctification. John Pless has written a study guide.
McCain: Yes, good book. One person confused about these issues wrote me to indicate that the Calvinists know how to do sanctification right, and he was not offering that as a compliment either to Calvinists or me. The down side of the Lutheran blogosphere is that those without adequate knowledge can spout off any sort of theory they wish. So, when it comes to swimming in the Lutheran blogosphere, there are few life guards on duty, so swim at your own risk!

Paul,
As one of the contributors to the previous endless thread on this subject (kind of like an Endless Pool, you just keep swimming but seemingly get nowhere), I do not want to have a repeat.
That said, I do want to say that in large part your concerns betray an apparent ignorance of what the confessions say, especially wrt your friends who claim their Christian freedom. (ie, those who claim the right to sin because of the grace of God etc). I do not mean to be rude about this, Paul. But I have tried to tell you that the confessions, over and over again, reject such behavior/reasoning/justification, and describe it as a absence of true faith, or an illusory faith. Therefore, their problem is NOT a problem of sanctification. Nor will preaching good works to them, describing/explicating works to/for them, exhorting them do any good, at that point, because for them, the 3rd use does not apply or work. The confessions explicitly reject the notion that the 3rd use can be applied to those without faith.
This whole business is premised upon the confessional distinction between Mortal and Venial Sin, which Chemnitz spends over 30 pages on in his Loci, Luther constantly refers to, the confessions assume over and over again, Walther spends at least one or two theses on in Law and Gospel, and Pieper references in a number of places. This distinction is lost among us, for all intents and purposes and the fruit that we see are the examples you give. But the answer is not preaching sanctification, as you mention it, at least for these folk. That would be a very crude confusion of Law and Gospel. In fact, it would be a denial of Art IV of the Apology, where the confessors reject that Roman notion that faith can exist in the heart of person who intends to continue or who actually lives, intentionally in sin. They called this Epicurean and no faith, against Rome who claimed faith could exist in such hearts.
So, Paul, part of your problem has nothing whatever to do with the preaching of sanctification, but of rightly preaching sin and grace, and rightly defining faith.
I think that your bunching these examples together creates confusion, especially in light of what you seem to be suggesting as a solution, that is preaching of, exhortations to good works to the regenerate, examples from Walther, Luther et al. These folks are not so, at least according to our confessions. They believe in an illusion.
McCain: David, I’m sure I have a lot more to learn about the Lutheran Confessios and will, by God’s grace, spend the rest of my life joyfully doing so, but I can’t really agree with you that the issue is that they lack faith. If this were the case I do not think our fathers would have gone to the lengths they want to talk about how we do speak to the regenerate about works and such. The Confessions do speak about willful sinning that drives out the Holy Spirit, and some of the folks I’m talking are not adequately mindful of this. But there are those who simply do, de facto, reject what the Confessions have to say about the regenerate person cooperating with the Holy Spirit in the life of holiness to which we are called. So, there is more here, David, than your point about mortal and venial sins. That’s a very valid and good point, but it is not the entire issue here nor does it explain entirely what’s going wrong in some Lutheran conversations about sanctification.

One other quick comment, Paul.
I often hear people talking about preaching sanctification, as you are in this post, but I have rarely seen anyone, yourself included, do much more than mention the fact that the Scriptures include paranetic (sp?) sections.
McCain: Actually, Dave, I posted one of my sermons on this topic, and I do not think I was merely “huffing and puffing” in it, but you may disagree.
What I find interesting is that while there is a lot of huffing and puffing about works, especially about being quite specific etc, one does NOT find this in the Scriptures, even in the paranetic (sp?) sections of the likes of Paul etc. As a matter of fact, the comments from Peter, Paul et al are quite general.
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McCain: David, but what Paul does is talk to the regenerate, as regenerate, about their lives in Christ. What is lacking in some Lutheran preaching is that kind of conversation about works. Instead, as I’ve seen in a recent sermon on marriage, all the pastor did was use Eph. 5 as a club to knock the regenerate over the heads to rebuke their sins against it [not saying that was wrong to do, no doubt just fine] but he nowhere in the sermon described the joyful privilege married persons have to love and honor their spouse, only how they are miserably failing to live up to God’s expectations. That’s the difference I’m talking about. I’m not saying we have to have a specific laundry list of assignments from the pastor each week, I am just asking for us to consider speaking about the good works to which we have been called in a way that St. Paul does, not in Rom. 1 fashion [second use] but in the “therefore, having been baptized into Christ” [third use]. I don’t think this is too hard a point to understand David, but you seem to be having problems understanding this. Perhaps it is because you are so intent on pushing the mortal/veniel point, with which I agree, by the way, that you just can’t see what I’m really trying to say?
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Pr. Speers continues: As I am just finishing a study on Romans, where Paul does not speak about Christian living until chapter 12, and having spent at least 3 months on chapters 12-15, I have to say that the exhortations are quite general. Love is the key, the fulfillment of the commandments. And love cannot be exercised by everyone the same way. That is, we do not have the same neighbors etc. I asked the class, what does Romans 13:8-10 mean? Could I give everyone the same exact exhortations and instructions about what this means? That is, specific good works? Not unless they all had the same neighbor? Luther reveled in the facts, against Rome, that we do not seek canon law/rulebooks, which tell us what to do, and that would include preachers. Rather, we are challenged and exhorted to love and ask ourselves “what does this mean” wrt my wife, my boss, etc. (so also the table of duties). Since we do not have the same wives (and here take note, that what nice things you do for your wife, while she might like them, would be received with less than great enthusiasm, if I did the same for my wife for the reason that you did it for yours…my wife might feel that I really did not pay attention to her, but sought a cheap, easy way out of my responsibilities as a husband. So also for other neighbors.), neighbors etc., it is never just about giving specific instructions/exhortations. Rather, it is about teaching the Word, and trusting that the Spirit will lead and guide the Christian to love, as *their* neighbor needs them to love.
We would like to find quick ways to sanctification, but these things take years for most of us to understand and apply, in the context of faith in Christ.
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McCain: Years to understand, but not years to preach/teach from the pulpit properly about these things. There is a third use of the Law but I hear the Law being preached primarily according to its second use. That’s my point.

McCain writes
The Confessions do speak about willful sinning that drives out the Holy Spirit, and some of the folks I’m talking are not adequately mindful of this. But there are those who simply do, de facto, reject what the Confessions have to say about the regenerate person cooperating with the Holy Spirit in the life of holiness to which we are called. So, there is more here, David, than your point about mortal and venial sins. That’s a very valid and good point, but it is not the entire issue here nor does it explain entirely what’s going wrong in some Lutheran conversations about sanctification.
Speers responds
First, I thought this was not the thread about cooperation…I posted on that one too…However, it is quite clear that sanctification is synergistic, understood correctly. The numerous texts from Paul etc, in which Paul claims a desire Romans 7, a striving (cf 2 Peter 1), etc. The new man cooperates, but does not EFFECT sanctification. That is wholly the work of God. (This is clearly stated in the Abiding Word article on sanctification and is nicely stated in Siegbert Becker’s Foolishness of GOd)
Paul, I purposely made reference to this *part* of your discussion…that is, those who claim to have faith but justify living as you note. I was not answering the whole post. But what I was answering was your continued use of this kind of example, which I think when discussing the issue of sanctification is out of place. Our Confessions clearly state this,
“They should rightly be used and urged to criticize and reject a complacent Epicurean delusion, since many people dream up for themselves a dead faith or superstition, without repentance and without good works, as if there could simultaneously be in a single heart both a right faith and a wicked intention to continue and abide in sin, which is impossible. Or as if a person could have and retain true faith, righteousness, and salvation even though he still is and continues to be a barren, unfruitful tree since no good fruits appear, yes, even though he were to persist in sins against conscience or embark deliberately on such sins again, which is impious and false.” (FC IV, 15ff)
Quit using these folk as an example of lacking proper preaching on sanctification, especially as you seem to think that telling them to live like Christians is an answer for their troubles…it is not, and it comes dangerously close to implying an agreement with Rome that such behaviors exist in those who can be said to have faith. This, our confessions say, is “impossible” “impious and false”. Our confessions in Apol IV, 48, begin their discussion about what justifying faith is, with a reference to the fact that Rome posits that faith can exist in the heart of someone living in mortal sin, and reject this over and over again. This preaching of the law is NOT being preached today Paul, and that is one reason why people act like you say.
Certainly, your post speaks about other issues, but this is NOT a problem, if one cares to make proper distinctions, with preaching sanctification. It is a problem with constitutes justifying faith. And here you are in danger of stumbling into one ditch or the other which Walther so nicely delineates in Law and Gospel, Thesis X
“In the sixth place, the Word of God is not rightly divided when the preacher describes faith in a manner as if the mere inert acceptance of truths, even while a person is living in mortal sins, renders that person righteous in the sight of God and saves him; or as if faith makes a person righteous and saves him for the reason that it produces in him love and reformation of his mode of living”
I think that is why you are having such disagreements, because the distinctions are not clear or accurate.

McCain: David, but what Paul does is talk to the regenerate, as regenerate, about their lives in Christ. What is lacking in some Lutheran preaching is that kind of conversation about works….I don’t think this is too hard a point to understand David, but you seem to be having problems understanding this. Perhaps it is because you are so intent on pushing the mortal/veniel point, with which I agree, by the way, that you just can’t see what I’m really trying to say?
Speers responds,
As I said in that thread, Paul, and in the last post I just posted, that you keep obscuring the discussion by bringing in examples which are NOT problems with sanctification, but justifying faith, according to our confessions. So, I am not having a problem understanding what you are *saying*, I am asking you to dispose of things that are extraneous to the discussion.
Finally, I think that while you might find people preaching one way, I will tell you, having spent 16 years in the parish, (listening to many sermons of different pastors at circuit et al, having sat through 16 years of circuit meetings and observed how discussions have often tumbled back into complaining about how immoral things are getting, and how rarely the answer to these problems in the parish can be found in the Gospel, but rather regularly degenerated into pointed moralizing, rejoicing (almost gleeful) in an ever sharper preaching of the law), that we are own worst enemy, and that wrt sanctification.
The gospel does not predominate in our preaching. The law does. At least according to my experience. And the way sanctification is preached is not from and to the gospel, but simply from the law.
David: I am not hearing sanctification preached, at all, in many cases. I hear people’s sins rebuked and condemned. I hear the people told, “But….you are forgiven” then I hear the Lord’s Supper extolled. But where in this is the great “therefore” that is so common throughout Paul’s epistles? That’s what I’m saying. Your points are all very good David. Perhaps you are right, we are coming at this from different concerns and experiences.

Like I said before the Law needs to be preached both with positive commands (Thou shall) and negative commands (Thou shall not), but is the Law any less preached when it is preached only using negative commands? Can the negative commands be used by the Spirit to guide us in good works as much as positive commands? Either way the Law should be preached specifically in accordance with the given lesson from Scripture. Maybe what is needed is more specific preaching of the Law and not just more Law preaching?
I think that issues get confused when blanket statements like they “indulged in profanity and obscenity” are used polemically. Using a four letter word is not sinful. Using a four letter to slander your neighbor is (Eigth Commandment), or continuing to use it around a person whom has expressed that it offends them (Romans 14)
McCain: To be more specific would require me actually to print what they said, and this I simply can not do. As for using unclean speech, I think the Apostle Paul actually did have something to say about this.

To make these passages about words with Anglo-Saxon roots instead of Latin roots is in my opinion to miss St. Paul’s point of how we use these words.
McCain: OK, I’m confused. I thought Paul was writing in Greek, not Latin. And the whole “That we lead chaste and decent lives in what we *say* and do” also would seem to preclude license to run about tossing off vulgarities and obscenities.

I apologize for the last post. Some necessary words were missing. It should have read:
To make these passages about not using words with Anglo-Saxon roots instead of Latin roots is in my opinion to miss St. Paul’s point which is how we use our words.
Obviously we should all be mindful of what we say, but we aren’t saying that saying !ss is more sinful than saying butt.
McCain: Saying “donkey” is certainly not sinful. Seriously, I see what you are saying, but…we do know that there are some archaic Anglo-Saxon words that, when used in their day, were not all considered vulgar or obscene, but today clearly are. So context and historical times would also come into play here. Hence, we prefer today, “pork” and “beef” to the “fleisch/flesh” of our Saxon ancestors, and … I can think of a few more interesting terms that were probably commonplace then, but today are regarded as obscene and vulgar and garner “R” ratings at the movies. The issue then becomes, should Christians use this kind of talk that is regarded as “dirty” or “filthy”? I truly do believe St. Paul’s words speak to this, etc.

One thing that helped a friend of mine greatly in this discussion regarding antinomianism and sanctification was a proper distinction between mortal and venial sins. When he stumbled across the idea in the works of Chemnitz, Melancthon, and Walther he was rather surprised, having thought it was simply a Roman construct. Once he realized he was sinning mortally in what he had been doing and thus stood as one who rejected his the faith, Christ worked through this new understanding to effect a sincere contrition.
As for those who have doubts as to the Scriptural/historical basis, the following sources argue the point better than I ever could:
http://www.clai.org.au/articles/mortal~1.htm
Martin Chemnitz – Loci Theologici, Vol. II, Locus 16
Philip Melanchthon – Loci Communes 1543, Locus 11
C.F.W. Walther – Law and Gospel, Thesis 10, 19
McCain: Hello King Adolphus! Welcome to the Lutheran blogosphere and thanks for your comment. Yes, that is a very important and helpful and necessary, and seemingly neglected distinction, but as I’ve told Pastor Speers, (perhaps you know him?), it is not the entire picture here of what I perceive to be lacking in some Lutheran preaching. There is simply no Biblical or Confessional justification for a lack of preaching sanctification in our sermons, and this preaching of sanctification need not be restricted only to the second function/use of the Law, as I’ve been saying.

Actually I don’t know Pr. Speers. Upon reading the posts above me more closely, I apologize for my repetition. I must say that I agree with your points Pr. McCain. It always seemed to me like we have an undue squeamishness to talk about doing good works even in Scriptural terms (as in 1 Thes.4 and 1 Peter 1) because a fear of works righteousness. I guess I always compared such issues to vocation. For example, Rom. 13 says that God works through government to do his will. It is certainly God’s work, but that doesn’t mean that magistrates don’t need to actually exercise the sword or other functions. I could sit on my couch all day waiting for God to do work through me like an enthusiast, or I could be virtuous in my vocation, meanwhile knowing and confessing that it is truly Christ working in me (It is know longer I who live, etc…Gal. 2:20). I guess I don’t see that as opposed to our confession. Frankly, that is why I like to use the term “virtuous” – it implies a good work that is not coerced (as opposed to “duty” which can lead to some ghastly exhortations, to be sure). Perhaps that is also why that fathers frequently speak in such terms as well. I realize that my comments here are rather pedestrian compare to many of the others but it is my hope that they contribute to the discussion at least a little

Pastor McCain,
Question. You wrote above that the “preaching of sanctification need not be restricted only to the second function/use of the Law.” I may be misunderstanding you here. Are you suggesting that the distinction between the second and third use of the law is made by the pastor in his sermon?
McCain: It would be, in my view, the difference between how St. Paul speaks in Romans 1-2 and how he speaks in Rom. 6 and 12.
I think if you were to clarify this point some of the other posters may more easily understand how “sanctification” or the third use of the law is preached; namely, by preaching the law. The application of the law (first, second, third use) is done not by the pastor in the sermon but by the Holy Spirit on those who hear the word.
McCain: Yes, yes and yes….I’ve said this a lot. Yes, the Holy Spirit uses His Word, both Law and Gospel how he wishes and will. However, he calls men o preach that Word and we can speak it in various ways. I am inclined to believe that this is not a case of “misunderstanding” but simply of wanting not to hear and finding excuses for it. [Not saying you are Carl, but clearly others just do not want to face these issues].
As such, when the pastor properly divides law and Gospel and preaches both accordingly, the Holy Spirit applies that word of law to one person as second use and to another as third. (Though, in reality, I suspect we hear both the second and third use.) As such, preaching “sanctification” does not mean ending the sermon with law. The law never motivates us to do anything good. It is always the Gospel that motivates us to serve and love our neighbor.
McCain: But, you see, I’ve been told, point blank, and if anyone cares to tackle the chore of reading all the posts and extended comments provided here, you will read how some pastors believe that if a sermon ends in any other way than with the pastor saying, “Your sins are forgiven” we have not properly distinguished between Law and Gospel and the Gospel has not in fact predominated in the sermon. There are simply some pastors out there who believe that if/when they preach against their people’s sins and tell them once again that they are poor, miserable sinners, then the HS will use the Law thus declared its “third use” and therefore they need not, and in fact, should not, have in their sermon any of the kind of NT parenesis we have from St. Paul.

I’ve only followed this discussion in the recent posts, but I think it would be much clearer for those following it if instead of speaking of “use of the law,” we distinguished it from “function of the law,” and were consistent in keeping this distinction.
As is partially alluded above, you can’t say “I’m have now preached the third use” to someone. It is the Holy Spirit who uses the law to convict, prevent, instruct, any combination of the three, or any other way that He will. (As Melancthon disputed with the antinomians, btw, he spoke of the law as having four or more functions, but only formally distinguished three main ones).
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McCain: Yes, the Holy Spirit is the one using the Law as he so chooses, however he chooses, in whomever He chooses. You are right Craig. The point however is that there is nothing wrong with preaching the Law in a “third use/function” kind of way…as St. Paul does in Rom. 12, etc. or as we read in Hebrews 12:1 or…well…in so much of the NT. It is entirely Biblical and therefore it surprises me that some Lutheran pastors seem to think there is something inappropriate about it, or shy away from it, no matter how good their reasons are for doing it. Luther didn’t. Walther didn’t. Neither did Christ or St. Paul, not to name drop.
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“Use” refers to how the Holy Spirit uses the law on a person. -We can hope and intend to convict someone, or instruct them, or whatever, but we cannot manipulate what the Holy Spirit will do in those who are hearing our preaching. For example, I can scold people from the pulpit for violent behavior, hoping to drive them to despair before God. But if they haven’t been violent they probably aren’t going to be convicted so much, as I may have been intending. Nevertheless, the law I preached to them concerning violence will probably instead be used more by the Holy Spirit on them in its first or third function – to alert them to what is right and wrong and hopefully to prevent/curb them from transgressing it and to help and support our neighbor in every bodily need.
“Function” refers to how the law has functioned on/ effected us.
As we commonly speak of the law and its effects, we should use the term “function” more often than “use.”
The three uses/functions are ordered the way they are, after all, because this is the way the law usually *functions* on a person as they receive it, as opposed to how it is used. -First, someone knows the law and is hopefully prevented from breaking it (a.k.a. curb). But then they see that the law really drives them to despair (second, mirror) because they have not done what it truly requires and so deserve God’s wrath. Once a person is forgiven, the law can show/instruct us in what good works we should do as we live by faith, and what is pleasing to God (third).
If we ordered our designations in terms of *use,* the second function would be labeled first, because this is the primary use and goal – to convict and kill… so that we can be raised in Christ. Secondarily it is to prevent open sin, and keep outward order. Thirdly, it instructs.

I certainly agree that theological distinctions should be clearly and consistently articulated. I must admit, though, I am at a loss on this whole use/function distinction. The word “usus” is, of course, rendered as either “use” or “function” and no distinction seems to be present in the Formula between these two words–again, the main reason being, the words are synonyms.
Since I’m not familiar with anyone using a distinction between “use” and “function” when discussing the law, I would appreciate it if someone could point me in the direction of some literature on the topic. Thanks.