# The Lutheran Pioneer_St. Louis_1883_S20 # Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration) 20 The Lutheran Pioneer. The Outlook from the Editor’s Window. —Ir would be well if in this Luther year the people would become thoroughly acquainted with the life and work of the great Reformer. - We are therefore glad to hear that a new Life of Luther is being prepared by Prof. A. L. Graebner of the Lutheran Seminary at Mil- waukee, Wis. It will appear, finely illus- trated, in ten numbers at the cost of 20 cents each number. Judging from the first number, which has just appeared, it will be a most ex- cellent work and, we doubt not, will find a wide circulation among the members of all our churches. It is published by the well-known Publishing House of Geo. Brumder, Milwau- kee, Wis. —TuErE is much discussion going on among Lutherans about what to do for the church in this Memorial Year in which the four hun- dreth anniversary of Luther's birth will be celebrated. The members of the Lutheran St. Matthew's congregation in New York city know what todo. At a recent meeting they resolved to aid in the building of the new Lu- theran Seminary in St. Louis. In order to awaken a greater interest in this work the pas- tor of the congregation, Rev. H. Sieker, by request preached and published a sermon on the Blessed Work of the faithful Lutheran Church in this country. This sermon will no doubt prove profitable reading also among the members of other congregations. It can be had for 10 cents per copy by addressing Rev. E, Bohm, 298 Broom St., New York, N. Y. —Oor Lutheran Deaf and Dumb Asylum near Detroit, Mich., is in a prosperous condi- tion. At a recent meeting of the Board of Directors the gratifying news was made known that the debt of the institution has been greatly decreased during the past year. —Tue Norwegian Lutheran Orphans’ Home at Wittenberg, Wis., was opened Jast year on the 26th of August by the Rev. Homme with three children and one aged person as its first inmates. By the blessing of God this number has since then steadily increased, so that an ex- tension of the accommodations will soon be a necessity. —Tae well-known ‘‘Life of Luther’ by Prof. Koestlin is being translated into English by Rev. Dr. Morris, of Baltimore, and will be published during this memorial year. From the Workman we learn that ‘it was the pur- _ pose of the Jamented Dr. Krauth to have based his Life of Luther on that of Koestlin, so that thé next best thing in the absence of Dr. Krauth’s book will bg. the elegant work of Koestlin, translated into good English.’” —Tae first Lutheran congregation in-York, Pa., was organized in the year1783. The first church building, a small log-house, was erected in 1744. ; ‘ ‘ —In the great African island of Madagascar the Norwegian Lutheran Missionary Society had 20 missionaries at work in 1881. There are 20,000 members connected with this mission. —Tne_ whole number of members connected with the Lutheran mission in South Africa is said to he 6,632. —Tne American Bible Society is making a canvass of the whole United States with the intention of supplying Bibles to all faiilies found without them. So far 288,718 families have been visited, of which 45,034 did not possess a complete copy of the Scriptures. —Aw edition of 11,000 copies of Gospels in Zulu, recently printed at the Bible House, has been put at the disposal of the American Board, for sale and distribution in Southern Africa, by the American Bible Society. —In 1800. there were 150 missionaries at work; now there are 125,000. In 1800 there were 50,000 heathen converts; now there are 1,650,000. —Tue report for 1882 from the Moravian mission among the natives of Australia says that the doomed race is. dying out rapidly. The Christian life leads them to reject the views of their fathers and arrests the progress of certain diseases; but they suffer from the sins of their fathers and they are rapidly dis- appearing. © The missionaries say that ‘in the course of a few years, the Australian mission will have lost its people,’ and their work will come to an end unless fresh fields in other parts of Australia are opened to them. —AnonG the millions of China, which was opened to foreigners in 1858, there are only 300 missionaries at work; and in Japan, which was opened to foreigners in 1868, there are no more than 88 missionaries engaged in Gospel work. —THE suggestive fact is published by a Phila- delphia paper that in a certain manufacturing town an employer, on a recent Saturday, paid to his workmen $700 in crisp new bills that had been secretly marked. On Monday $450 of those identical bills were deposited in the bank hy the saloon-keepers. ' —REticiovus statistics are published, and show the total amount contributed by the vari- ous denominations in the United States the. past year, for benevolent and congregational purposes to be $106,962,000, of which the amount collected for purely benevolent pur- poses is $31,331,150. The amount contributed for church purposes, including the maintenance of the Church, sustaining the ministry, &c., is $75,252,866. There are 92,653 Protestant churches in the United States, with 71,602 ministers and 9,003,030 members. These fig- | ures may safely be left to tell their own story. '—TnxeE Chinese Province of Hunan has 15,000,000 inhabitants, and not a single resi- dent missionary. —TneE various Bible Societies now repre- sented in Japan, make it a rule never to give away the Scriptures. They have sold together 115,000 copies during the past year. It is stated that at Kioto a single copy of St. John’s Gospel led sixty families to renounce idolatry. —TuE Outlook, of London, says: ‘‘Morocco, which is peopled by perhaps the finest Moslem race in the world, numbering eight or nine mil- lions, presents a stern wall to the Christian faith. We understand that the Emperor will not permit a Christian to live in the interior of his country.”’ —Spam, a Roman Catholic country, has nevertheless 32 Protestant churches and chap- els, with a membership of 28,000, mostly of the poorer people. —_s--+¢-<4o> —o Short Stops. —Nor long ago a ship was wrecked upon the reefs of an island in the Pacific. ‘The sail- ors, escaping to land, feared lest they might fall into the hands of savages. One climbed a bluff to look over the island. Turning to his companions, he shouted, ‘‘Come on! Here's a Church!’’ A simple story, but one which puts to the skeptic the searching question: Why was it safer for the shipwrecked men to go where a church reared its cross than where there was none? —How many members are there in your church? ‘*Well,”’ said an elder, ‘I tell ’em we've got about ten to he depended on to do anything, though we've got more than a hun- dred on the books.’’ It was one of the churches in which a small proportion of the members largely does the work and pays the bills. —Votralr_, the French infidel, prophesied that in this nineteenth century the Bible would become extinct. The room in which Voltaire wrote that prophecy was in the year 1881 filled from floor to ceiling with Bibles for Switzer- land. —A MODERATE Scotch minister, who was a keen fisher, once said to Dr. Andrew Thomson, “IT wonder you spent so much time on your sermons with your ability and ready speech. Many’s the time I’ve written a sermon and killed a salmon before breakfast,’’ to which saying Dr. Thomson replied, ‘‘Well, sir, I’d rather have eaten your salmon than listened to your sermon.”’ —A CLERGYMAN was met the other day by a ragged individual with a flask of whiskey in his pocket, who inquired, ‘‘Sir, is this the near- est road to the poor-house?’’ ‘‘No, sir,’’ said the clergyman, pointing to the bottle, ‘‘ but that is.’ St. Paul’s Colored Lutheran Church, Littte Kock, Ark. 1 on corner of 12th and Rock Sts. Sunday at 2 o’clock. and 7 o’clock. Chay Sunday-school meets eve! Divine services at 3 o’cloc! TERMS: Tre LuTHERAN ‘PIONEER is published monthly, pevable in adyance at the following rates, postage included, to-wit: 50 eecccccscsscccsccescssccccs 9.00 Club rates only allowed if all copies are to be sent to one address. ~ Sp All business communications to be addressed to »Luth. Concordia Publishing House“, M..0, Baz- ae Agt., St. Louis, Mo. ‘ All communications concerning the editorial de- ent to be addressed to Pror. R. A. BiscnorF, mcordia College, Fort Wayne, Ind.