# Synodical Conference Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1898_S41
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

of the Ev. Luth. Synodical Conference of North America. 1898. 41

met with deadly enmity and have been hunted like wild beasts from city to city and from land to land; but behold, they have proved themselves the heavenly leaven, full of divine power and eternal life, which has leavened the world and planted a kingdom of heaven among men, wherein sinners come to grace and salvation, to peace and blessedness, so that even the hostile world must see it with astonishment and wonder.

The fulfilment of the words of our parable is set before our eyes also in our *Negermiſſion* [mission among African Americans; the period's term "Negro Mission"], ever since its founding 21 years ago, but especially in the last two years, on which we have to report to the honorable *Synodalconferenz* [Synodical Conference]. Leaven-like, that is, unpromising and despised, was its beginning, and so its progress has remained to this very day. It is not only the God-hating world that looks with anger on this work of God and asks scornfully: What is the use of this waste? Even from Christian lips one hears the proud remark: I cannot get enthusiastic about the Negro Mission. It is a superfluous good work! — And these are not mere words. Our missionaries experience them as facts. Because of this divine office of theirs, they and their wives, among the Negroes, are outcasts and outlaws in the eyes of the better, that is, the more genteel, population of the South. The hotels refuse them a seat at their table or a bed for the night. No friendly greeting is given to their wives on the street. Besides this, offenses, sin and death lie upon this work of God as well, and the last two years report of these too. The shameful apostasy of Missionary Meyer in Salisbury from the truth to the abominable error of the Baptists took place shortly before the last convention of the honorable Synodical Conference, and its evil consequences have not died away even now. Immediately before that same convention, death had also robbed our oldest missionary, Bakke, so faithfully proven in devoted service, of his faithful life's companion, and today we must report that a few days ago his only child, his daughter of almost 18 years, was likewise taken from him by death. Solitary and alone he now stands, with almost broken health, in his heavy labor. Another heavy loss the mission suffered through the death of the Negro student Im. Burthlong. He was just about to take his theological examination at the seminary in Springfield. During his years of study he had taken a faithful part in the work of the Negro station there; the Negroes had great confidence in him. It was the intention that he should take over this station, and with great hopes of a blessed ministry there we looked into the future for this congregation, twice before deceived by unfaithful missionaries. The man's rich gifts, his faithful diligence and the sincere life of faith in him justified the greatest hopes. But God's thoughts were otherwise. Galloping consumption carried him off in a short time. A second Negro student in this seminary, until now blameless, gifted and diligent, has fallen