# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1847 06 01_S112
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

...conduct toward the weak in faith.

Godlessness and contempt of God are one thing; weakness of faith is another. The former is to be earnestly rebuked and condemned; the latter, though it is not to be praised, is nevertheless by no means to be met harshly. For the weaker someone is in faith, the more God cares for him precisely on that account.

Do you not see how a mother behaves toward her sick little son? Does she push him away and trample him underfoot because he is weak and ailing? Far from it; if he were to die, she would carry him to the grave with great heartache; but as long as he still lives and breathes, she nurses and tends him all the more carefully the harder and more severe his sickness is, while meanwhile she seems to take no care at all for those of her children who are still strong and healthy. Yet the love of God toward the weak among his own surpasses every natural motherly affection of mothers toward their children. "Though she should forget her child," he says, "yet I will not forget you." Isa. 49:15. Let us therefore, in our care for the weak, imitate this divine love and, as Paul exhorts, receive the weak in faith and bear their infirmities (Rom. 14:1; 15:1), so that the Lord our God may also have patience with our weaknesses and forgive them to us.
Brentius.

Lutheran Church Hymnal.

Many false masters now compose hymns; take care, and learn to judge them rightly.

Wherever God builds his church and his Word, there the devil too wants to be, with deceit and murder.
Luther.

The new "Church Hymnal for Evangelical Lutheran Congregations of the Unaltered Augsburg Confession," announced in No. 12 of this volume, edited by several Lutheran preachers in Missouri and published by the local Lutheran congregation, has now left the press. Its outward arrangement is as follows: pages I–XII contain, besides the title, the table of contents and the alphabetical index of hymns; pages 1–380 contain the hymns, 437 in number; pages 381–390 contain the index of tunes, and pages 391–420 the first appendix, consisting of morning, evening, confession, communion, sickbed, deathbed, and other prayers, a form for emergency baptism, the customary antiphons, etc. A second appendix consists of Luther's Small Catechism, and a third the three ecumenical creeds together with the Unaltered Augsburg Confession. The whole book comprises 516 pages in the usual German hymnal format, set in such type as the new New-York edition of Luther's House Postil. The price for a copy, well bound in leather, tooled, with marbled edges, is 75 cents. Mr. Ludwig in New York has had the kindness to see to the printing and binding, so that it surely needs no assurance that the outward presentation of the book has certainly turned out to the satisfaction of all who will use it.

As for the hymns that were included, the choice of them was governed chiefly by the following considerations: that they be pure in doctrine; that they have already found the most general possible acceptance in the orthodox German Lutheran church, and have thereby received from it as unanimous a testimony as possible that they have flowed from the right spirit; that, since the book is intended in the first place for public worship, they should not so much express the particular, changing circumstances of individual persons as rather contain the language of the whole church; and finally, that, although bearing the stamp of Christian simplicity, they should not be rhymed prose, but rather the products of a true Christian poetry. The editors have been keenly aware of what a great task they had to accomplish; in undertaking it they utterly despaired of their own wisdom, and earnestly called upon God for the illumination and guidance of his Holy Spirit, and especially for the gift of testing and discerning the spirits; they can assure the reader that they went about this work with fear and trembling, and selected, out of the immense treasury of German hymns which the Christian church possesses, only those which, according to the grace God had given them, they recognized as worthy above all others to be handed down from child to grandchild, and preserved as an inventory, as an inalienable possession of the church of the German tongue. May our Lord Jesus Christ, who ascended on high and gave gifts to men, also lay an overflowing blessing upon this little hymnal.

With this church hymnal, to be sure, the next need — that of the household — has not been entirely overlooked either; but, as has been said, provision has first of all been made for the need of the church. It has therefore been considered that, in time, a special House Hymnal should follow it as a second part, should the desire for this clearly make itself known in the congregations.

Since the editors were concerned above all with giving the most valuable hymns for so small a hymnal, admittedly little regard could be paid to the general familiarity of the tunes belonging to them. Yet not only does the accompanying index of tunes point, in most cases, to well-known melodies with which the unfamiliar ones can, in case of need, be exchanged, but we also intend to publish, within the next months, a separate lithographed little tune-book for our hymnal, so as to remedy any difficulty that might arise in some congregations. We also believe that we have good reason to see to it that the splendid, rich treasury of our church melodies likewise be preserved.

To those who intend to acquire the hymnal, we announce that they can obtain it, against cash payment, either through Mr. Heinrich Ludwig, New York, Vesey Street, No. 70 & 72, or through Mr. F. W. Barthel, care of Mr. A. B. Tschirpe, St. Louis, Mo. Finally, we would also point out that congregations considering this need not fear that the hymnal will soon be out of print, since it has been set in standing type.

Dr. M. Luther's Church Postil.

We recently inquired of Mr. H. Ludwig how matters stand regarding the projected publication of the above book, and, to our sorrow, received the news that up to now no more than 284 subscribers have been found for it. We cannot therefore refrain from calling to the attention of our dear brothers in the ministry, who know what a treasure is entrusted to our church precisely in Luther's two Postils, that it is our sacred duty to make use of the opportunity now offered us, so that the blessing of those never-aging writings may be turned toward and preserved for our American Lutheran church. If we fail to do this, how shall we one day be found to be faithful stewards? Should we not think here of James's saying: "Whoever knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin" (4:17)? Let us also consider, dear brothers, not only what a formidable fellow-combatant we place at our side, together with Luther, against the army of the Roman Antichrist that presses ever further forward here, but also how important it is, for the sake of the Protestant sects, whether called Lutheran or not, that Luther's voice should sound forth here again from the grave — since every Protestant, if he has not yet been entirely swallowed up by unbelief or fanaticism, still has some conscience left to listen to Luther's voice. Let no one be made slack by the thought that the work will be too expensive, that it will find few buyers, and that it will therefore not come about after all. Let each one only do, in his own circle, as much as he can, and we shall shortly see how the Lord of the church has furthered the work. As for the conditions under which, and the way by which, the work may be obtained, we take the liberty of referring the kind reader to No. 15 of our paper.

Dr. M. Luther's House Postil.

We hereby announce that we are again supplied with a fair stock of bound copies of this book, and that it can be purchased for $2.00 both at our residence and at the residence of Mr. Tschirpe, the apothecary.

Dr. M. Luther's Small Catechism.

1 copy, 10 cents; 1 dozen for $1.00; 100 copies for $7.00; for sale by F. W. Barthel in St. Louis. Orders from elsewhere should be directed care of A. B. Tschirpe.

Paid:
3rd year: Rev. Pastor Brohm (4 copies)
2nd half of the 3rd year: Messrs. Bewersdorf, A. Busch, A. Kerkhof, Wefel.
1st half of the 4th year: the gentlemen Busch, A. Kerkhoff.

Received for the Lutheran mission to the heathen on the Cass River, Mich., through Rev. Pastor Hengist, from the Salem congregation in Salem Township, $1.00, and from the Jerusalem congregation in Hickory Township, $2.00, both in Mercer Co., Pa.

Printed by Arthur Olshausen.