# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_August 1860_S255
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

255 Church and Contemporary Affairs.

take leave next year, if his strength — which God grant may still long be preserved to us — is not to be worn away entirely; and in recent days a letter also arrived from Baierlein, saying that the doctor had ordered him a longer leave and a return to Europe, if he did not wish to risk a nervous breakdown or a stroke. All this be commended to God the Lord! "I thank Thee that Thou hast humbled me," our mission may well say. After the Kyrie comes the Gloria. Above all: among our missionaries out there there is peace, which God grant in his grace to preserve and ever more firmly establish. The church government tends to its office with praiseworthy care and wisdom; the church visitation has been set in motion; the last synod at Tranquebar was a harmonious one, attended by the blessing of brotherly strengthening. Received in the past year were 507. Among these are 115 heathen and 150 children of Christians, who were added to the congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ through holy baptism; from other church communions, notably the Roman [Catholic] one, 236, and 6 apostates, returned. The total number of Christians in our mission church amounts to 4,600, among whom 9 European missionaries and 148 native helpers are presently working. Income, which this year was some 10,000 thalers less than in the previous year — partly, no doubt, on account of the hardship of the times, but even more because of the mismatch between the timing of the Board's closing of accounts and that of the individual societies, and because of the earlier occurrence of Whitsuntide — amounted to about 42,000 thalers; among the contributors, Saxony stands with about 8,000, Bavaria with 7,000, Russia with 6,200 (of which Livonia alone accounts for 4,000), Hanover with 5,300, Sweden with 3,380, Mecklenburg-Schwerin with 2,000, Denmark with 1,800, Australia with about 1,300, the Francke Foundation with 1,000, Kurhesse with 650, Thuringia with 600, Reuss with 450, Lauenburg with 430, Mecklenburg-Strelitz with 380, France (Alsace) with 370, the Grand Duchy of Hesse with 300, Holstein with 200, Waldeck with 180 thalers, and so on. Expenditures amounted to about 38,000 thalers. The decline in income did not deter the Board from taking in hand the establishment of a printing house at Tranquebar to support the mission, and especially the work of Blomstrand. These days the foreman of this printing house now being set up, Hobusch, is departing by way of London for the East Indies, after having trained himself further in a range of technical skills such as bookbinding, wood-engraving, and so forth. To be sure, the setting up of even a quite modest printing house always costs several thousand thalers. But God will provide for the money. Döderlein will make the journey with him as a missionary — a man who, after nearly ten years of church service in Bavaria, and after having carried in his heart for seven years the wish to place himself at the service of his church's mission, now sets out, with the blessing of his parents as of his church, to bring help to those overburdened with work out there. May others soon follow him as well! God grant that the hopes to which the good condition of the institution entitles us may be fulfilled!

Since, of the 5 Swedes, 3 have returned to their homeland because their preparation was taking too long, the institute now numbers 9 pupils, among them 3 students. May God preserve among them the spirit of simplicity, humility, and harmony, and equip them with the riches of his gifts! The great streams of the world will run dry, but the water of Siloam shall cover the earth.

With the utterance of this hope of faith the report closed, and there followed — after the singing of the verses "Abide with Thy Blessing" and "Abide with Thy Protection" — the commissioning of Döderlein by Pastor Dr. Ahlfeld in a moving address and intercession, answered by the pledge of the delegate. The singing of "Thou Holy Fire, Sweeter Comfort" preceded the altar prayer of Pastor Rüdel of Nuremberg, which bore a genuinely liturgical character, whereupon the closing liturgy and singing brought the celebration to a close.

A common midday meal gathered a larger number of friends of the mission. Thereupon the deputies assembled in the mission house for the general assembly, which, beginning and closing with singing and prayer, was, after the disposal of credentials, filled chiefly by the Director's more detailed report. Its substance has already been mentioned above. Here let it only further be noted that the order for the ordination of natives, sent out by the Board and standing essentially in agreement with the relevant provisions of the Decision in