# The Lutheran Pioneer_St. Louis_1883_S12 # Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration) 12 The Lutheran Pioneer. The Outlook from the Editor’s Window. " _Frowr the Concordia Publishing House, St. Louis, Mo., we have received the official re- port of the recent convention of the Synodical Conference. The price of the large pamphlet is 85 cents. Besides the report of our Mission Board it contains discussions pertaining to the ‘burning question.’’ And as we learn from the papers of the opponents of the Synodical Conference that they wish all the people to read both sides of the question, we trust that this report, together with other publications of our synods, will find a wide circulation also among the members of their congregations. Please, don’t smile. —A NuMBER of ladies of the Norwegian Lu- theran Trinity Church in Otter Tail County, Minn., Rev. O. A. Normann, pastor, have formed a Sewing Society with the view of aid- ing in the mission work of the church. From, this society we recently received $25.00 for our Colored Mission. May God bless the kind do- nors and prosper the work of their hands. —Oor thanks are also due to several young lady-friends of our Colored Mission in St. Paul’s Lutheran Church, Fort Wayne, Ind., of whom: we received $8.08 -for our mission among the freedmen of the South. —Oour readers surely have read about the floods along the Ohio River. From the Aurora News we clip the following description of a funeral procession upon the water: To-day the. solemn and impressive scene of a funeral cor- tege moving upon the face of an angry flood was witnessed for the first time in the city of Aurora. It was the funeral of Mrs. Anna I’. Reichert. ‘The services were held in St. John’s Lutheran Church, and conducted by, Rev. Runkle, after which the remais were ;trans- ported by water to Riverview Cemetery. It was an impressive scene as the ‘procession moved slowly and silently along. The high- way leading to the cemetery, being still sub- merged by the flood, yawls were brought into requisition to convey the body and the friends to the cemetery. Hundreds who were strangers stood by the margin of the river to behold the procession of little boats as it moved silently on the bosom of the swollen Ohio. The sun shone brightly. All who witnessed the scene were deeply affected and mournfully watched the strange procession as it disappeared with its sacred charge behind the bluff, hard by the city of the dead. —From the report of our Lutheran Immi- t missionary at New York we learn that 83,000 tracts and 3,000 almanacs, besides many church papers, were distributed during the year 1882. $78,000 passed through the mis- sionary’s hands. 5266 persons were assisted on their westward journey, and employment was obtained for 227 persons. $664.00 were given to the entire destitute and $8,645.83 loaned to those in temporary need. 5,376 letters and postal cards were received and 3,951 were written by the missionary. —TneE LriBRARY of the lamented Dr. Krauth, late Professor in the Lutheran Seminary at Philadelphia, is said to be one of the most care- fully selected in the whole country. It con- tains about fifteen thousand volumes and is valued at about $60,000. —A SECULAR paper writes as follows upon the increase of the Lutheran Churchin A merica: ‘The Lutheran Church has shown the most remarkable growth in this country. The mem- bership has doubled in the last ten years. The gains reported for 1882 were 62,000, equaling the total membership of the denomination in this country a generation ago. This largest Protestant denomination of the world now stands third in numbers in this country, and at the present rate of increase it will soon be the strongest numerically in the United States. Her creed is the oldest, and her liturgy one of the most simple and beautiful.” — Danis Luraeran ministers were the first to bring the Gospel to the colored people in the West Indies. When Count Zinzendorf, in the year 1739, came to the Island of St. Thomas, he held an evening service for the colored ‘people of that place. He began his sermon with Luther’s explanation of the Second Ar- ticle of the Apostles’ Creed. The colored people arose and fell in with him to his great surprise. Lutheran Danish ministers had taught them the Catechism many years before the ar- rival of the Moravian missionary. —A_ Curyese Convert, Kum Ling, has re- turned to his own country and is the first na- tive Chinaman who has gone back as a mis- sionary among his own people. —TueE Danisn Lurueran Bible Society, in the sixty-eighth year of its existence, has dis- tributed 4600 copies of the Holy Scriptures— one half of them being of the New Testament. In connection with the British Bible Society, it has circulated one million of Bibles—one to every two of the inhabitants of Denmark. In Norway also the work of circulating the Scrip- tures is carried on with great zeal. —Mr. Roserr, who recently left a Romish cloister in Brooklyn, N. Y., and renounced the false doctrines of the Romish Church, says in speaking of his experience in the cloister: ‘‘I spent four years in the cloister. I thought I would find there men of charity, men of prayer, men only living for the good of their fellows and dedicated to God’s service. But I was greatly disappointed. I found among them nothing but selfishness, ignorance, uncharitable- ness, and a great deal of drunkenness.” 3 4 oo —Tue English Universities Mission has a chain of stations along the old slave routes in Central Africa, from Zanzibar to Lake Nyassa. They have a church, school-house and mission- house at the old slave market of Zanzibar, and 180 released slaves were placed there under in- struction last year. In one village on the line are 200 persons restored to their. homes from _| the slave market. Short Stops. —Durineé an earthquake that occurred a few years since the inhabitants of a small village were generally very much alarmed, but they were at the same time surprised at the calmness and apparent joy of an old lady whom they all knew. At length one of them, addressing the old lady, said: ‘‘ Mother, are you not afraid?” ““No,”’ said the mother in Israel, ‘I rejoice to know that I have a God that can shake the world.”” —