Behnken was a Sassedotalist

Because conditions in Germany were in a state of complete chaos, we naturally had a difficult time getting passports and visas. Through the kind aid of Herbert Waltke, a St. Louis businessman and a personal friend of President Truman, we were able to secure the necessary documents and to book passage for the Atlantic crossing on October 8 [1945?].

The NLC group informed us that because of important commitments they could not leave on that date. Dr. Meyer and I decided, however, that we should not delay our departure if we intended to carry out one of the important objectives of our visit. Information had reached us that a movement was under way in Germany, influenced by the Swiss Reformed theologian Dr. Karl Barth and a number of theologians in Germany, to join Lutheran, Reformed, and Unierte (United) church bodies into a single Evangelical Church in Germany. We hoped to reach Germany in time to caution the Lutheran bodies against forming such a union, which in its very essence would involve compromising Lutheran confessional principles.

The organization of the Evangelische Kirche in Deutschland (EKiD), we learned, however, had been effected before we arrived. Some may be inclined to question whether our testimony would have done much good, but we felt constrained at least to try. We learned too, that a

number of German theologians had raised the very warning we intended to give, among them Dr. Hermann Sasse of the University of Erlangen. So vigorously did this scholarly professor protest the dilution of Lutheranism through this hybrid union that it eventually led to a rift between him and former close friends and associates. Yet he remained true to his convictions.

John Behnken, This I Recall, p. 88-89