# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1848 01 11_S77
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Church News.

Mr. Carl Fricke, whom most readers will recall from the first annual report of the Synod of Missouri, etc., as having served last summer as a visitor (traveling preacher) of the same, has been duly called by a German Lutheran congregation at White Creek, Indiana, to be their pastor, and he has now accepted this call. He was ordained on the 7th of November of last year by Pastor Dr. Sihler, with the assistance of Pastor Wolter, whereupon he entered upon his office in God's name on the fourth Sunday in Advent. His present address is: Rev. C. Fricke, Columbus, Bartholomew Co., Ind.

Several months ago the Hanoverian candidate of theology, Mr. E. Brauer, arrived here in order to serve the orthodox American Lutheran Church, to which he had received an express invitation from here. He has been called by a German Lutheran congregation near Addison in Dunkley's Grove, Ill., to the pastoral office there, which had recently become vacant — a call which Candidate Brauer has likewise accepted. After he had applied to the Synod of Missouri, etc., for ordination, he received it from the German Lutheran pastor in Chicago, A. Selle, with the cooperation of the Danish Lutheran pastor there, Schmidt, on the 15th of December of last year, before the congregation in Dunkley's Grove. The address of the newly entered dear brother in office is: Rev. E. Brauer, Addison, Illinois.

Thoughts on 2 Cor. 3:4–11.
(By W. Löhe.)

"The ministry of the New Testament" — what a name! There are all sorts of offices among men, but which of them all could boast of a name like the name of the office of a servant of Christ? It is an office "not of the letter" — not of the Law, which was laid before man's eyes and conscience only on tablets of stone, without his being able to make it his own with delight and love and to live in it. It is an office "of the Spirit," so called because it "gives the Spirit" through the preaching of the Gospel. It takes from the sinner distaste and mistrust and fills him with delight and trust and love and strength, makes of him another man, restores in him God's image, in the world the Church, on earth God's paradise.

What an office! No man is fit for it by nature. It is the Spirit's work if anyone is fit. And who is faithful in it! Who does not tremble? — Go to the deathbeds of children who die in the grace of baptism — go to the people who, in modest callings of life, pursue eternal life, to the hearers, to the faithful children of the Church! See them die! Ah, how beautiful, how easy it often is! But how hard many pastors have died! Who is to die blessedly, if the Gospel does not comfort? I ask this, and say to it: "A pastor needs more comfort of the Gospel than others; for the office, the high, exalted office, is dishonored by him with much unfaithfulness! But church members should pray that their pastors may feel the comfort with which they have comforted others." Yet a pastor can die blessedly, thank God! But peacefully? But without temptation? But in peace, in joy? — God have mercy on all pastors to whom, in the anguish of death, the dignity of their office, and what they ought to have done, is shown!

The office has clarity and gives clarity! But the persons who bear it are, like Moses, the most afflicted of all men. Those who look only at their faults do not know this! But it will one day be made manifest. When the Lord shall someday make some among His servants shine like the splendor of heaven, then it will be made manifest out of what night of tribulation they came to their light! — — — If I had space and time, I would praise the office! But now a sigh over its glory and a tear over our sin is all that I have to give for this glorious text.

"With peace and joy I now depart," etc.
(Luther.)

In the last century there lay in Lübeck a respected merchant, mortally ill. Given up by the physicians, he asked that the town musicians be brought to him and made to play their instruments before him, so that he might now experience what David extols: "Thou hast turned my mourning into dancing." (Ps. 30:2.) But his wife and friends did not want to allow it, fearing it might bring him an ill reputation before the world. When, however, he persisted in his request, it was granted him with the permission of his confessor, all the more since he desired only a dance or song of praise in David's manner. When the musicians had come to him in his chamber, he asked that they sing him the glorious hymn of Jesus, "I love Thee dearly, O Lord," and play instruments along with it. Thereupon the singers and musicians struck up the song, during which the dying man, in order to attend to his devotion undisturbed, turned his face to the wall. When they had finished the hymn, his wife asked him whether he desired anything more? — But he had fallen asleep during the song of praise.

Another Renunciation of the General Synod.

We have just learned from the Reformed "Christian Journal" that the Evangelical Lutheran "Pittsburgh Synod," formed not long ago, whose members formerly belonged to the West Pennsylvania Synod, resolved at its recent assembly not to be incorporated into the so-called General Synod of the Lutheran Church, and this because the General Synod approves essential deviations from the doctrine of the Evangelical Lutheran Church. The Christian Journal regards this step as all the more important since the leading members of the Pittsburgh Synod, Mr. Passavant of Pittsburgh, Mr. Bassler of Zelienople, and others, were themselves trained at the seminary in Gettysburg, which seminary, as is well known, stands under the guardianship of the General Synod. Rightly does the aforementioned journal regard this renunciation as a sign of the times in the Lutheran Church, and as a clear proof that the Reformed-Methodist tendency, which seemed to be fairly widespread within it, is beginning to turn. May God awaken ever more synods and congregations who are ashamed to join a synod that rejects precisely the distinguishing doctrines of our Evangelical Lutheran Church and that is nevertheless so bold as to call itself the General Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. There was indeed a time in America when it seemed as though the General Synod would remain in undisputed possession of the title it had given itself, but that time is past. May the time soon come when the General Synod itself either voluntarily lays aside the mask of its false name or — what God would rather grant — penitently recognizes its apostasy from its mother church, confesses it, publicly asks pardon for it, and returns to her again with all its heart. Amen.

Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with salt, that ye may know how ye ought to answer every man. Col. 4:6.

One must, namely, speak differently to a prince than to a subject; differently to a rich man than to a poor man. Why? Because the minds of the rich and of princes are too weak not to become somewhat conceited. Hence it is necessary to condescend more to them and to accommodate oneself to them. The minds of the poor and of those who are subject to others can bear more and are not so taken up with themselves. Hence one can use greater freedom in speaking with them, having in view only the one thing, namely, edification. Not because the one is poor and the other rich should the latter be honored more and the former less, but for the sake of weakness the one should be borne with more than the other. Chrysostom.

Testimony of a United-Evangelical Man Concerning the Nature and Doings of the Methodists.

Pastor Rauschenbusch, who formerly held an evangelical pastoral office in Germany and who immigrated here two years ago in order to take up, as a preacher, the cause of the ecclesiastically orphaned German Protestants, especially here in the West, has, after