# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1847 10 13_S152
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

fault? We try in every way to compel them to become better, and yet we accomplish nothing." "You compel them," replied Anselm. "Tell me, my dear abbot, if you planted a tree in your garden, and immediately hemmed it in on every side so that it could spread its branches in no direction, and then after some years set such a tree out again into the open, what sort of growth do you think it would have become? Surely a useless tree with crooked branches grown into one another. And whose fault would that be, other than your own, who confined the tree so tightly?"

"God loveth a cheerful giver."

A man who had been driven into exile for the sake of his faith approached Dr. Luther for a gift. Since he himself had in his purse only a single Joachimsthaler, which he had long saved, he called out cheerfully, [illegible]: "Joachim, come forth, the Savior—"

Truth fears nothing except being concealed. — Tertullian.

(Submitted.)
Divine Preservation of a Child.

"The secret of a king and of princes should be kept, but the works of God should be gloriously proclaimed and revealed." Tobit 12:8.

In the high Thuringian Forest, in the region of Hildburghausen, there occurred during the winter of the year 1819 an event which, as a proof of God's special providence, deserves renewed publication and heartfelt attention. The editor of the Hildburghausen Village Newspaper tells the story as follows: Our region in the high Thuringian Forest had so much snow this winter that we old folk could haul wood on sledges, and our young people could carry on their usual sledding parties, even though they wear no furs but only a sturdy shirt on their bodies. Such a shirt-runner, a boy of four years, met us yesterday evening outside the village and wanted to go to his father, who had gone into the forest for wood. The curly head of the little red-cheeked boy was snow-white with frost, for it was terribly cold. We told him his father would surely be home by now, and so, though weeping, we brought him back to his mother. She, being just then occupied in washing potatoes, had scarcely time to scold him a little; she gave him Hübner's Bible History with pictures to play with, and by the time the potatoes were in the oven, the boy was already out in the snow again. The mother calls in the yard and in the village, but hearing and seeing nothing of him, becomes anxious; yet she thinks: he will surely come along with his father, and puts another piece of wood in the stove. But the father comes and brings nothing with him but wood, and has not seen his little boy either. Now the mother's fear awakens in earnest, and since the boy was nowhere to be found in the whole village, it drives all us neighbors out with lanterns into the dark forest, the mother always in front, holding her eldest son by the hand so that she would not lose him too, and so that he could cry out if she no longer could. The whole forest becomes bright and alive; we scatter, call out, and search in every ravine, but in vain. We come together again; it is midnight, and still no trace of the boy.

"If only he had his new shoes with nails on," says the brother, "we would surely see him in the snow." "Or his new Christmas trousers," says the mother, "he must have frozen to death in this terrible cold."

We all shiver with cold, only the mother is burning hot. — And though we all know he must be dead if he is still in the forest, still we will not abandon the unhappy mother, who runs over the crackling snow into every ravine and cries out hoarsely.

"There he lies, dead!" suddenly calls out the eldest brother in just such a deep ravine, and the mother throws herself, screaming, upon her Benjamin, who lies with his face on the snow. At this the little boy wakes up, looks around, astonished at the people and the lights, complains of no cold, and clings affectionately to his mother. What her feelings were can only be understood by a mother who has ever been in such or a similar situation. After the little boy had recognized us all, he told us: he had run after his father, had called out continually, but when he could not find his father and became cold, he had wanted to go back home to his mother. But he had not known the way and had wept bitterly, and then, like the little Samuel in the picture Bible, he had knelt down and called upon the dear Lord God for help. Then the dear Lord God had come in a beautiful, snow-white, shining robe, had taken him by the hand, led him into the ravine where no wind blows, laid him down upon his face, and said to him very kindly: "Sleep there until your mother comes." He had fallen asleep and slept on until his mother woke him.

For every Christian who believes the Bible to be God's Word, this touching story renews the confirmation that our little children stand under the special protection of the angels of God, who, at the command of the Lord, whose face they always behold, hasten to hold out their hands to our children—surrounded as they are by dangers—especially where a father's or mother's hand cannot reach the beloved child. How literally was God's promise in Psalm 91:11–12 fulfilled in this little one! How graciously, too, did the great God hear the simple, childlike prayer of the boy, according to his promise, Ps. 103:18: He regardeth the prayer of the destitute, and despiseth not their prayer. Would that all dear children might learn to bring their concerns so childlike to their dear heavenly Father; then, even in early youth, they would learn from their own experience how good it is to trust in the Lord, who is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or understand.

To us parents, too, this story shows quite plainly how useful and wholesome it is, already in the child's early years, as soon as their minds are able to grasp anything, to set before them—rather than the many useless pictures that often come into their hands—biblical pictures instead, and to tell them in a childlike way the stories depicted in them; this often makes a very deep impression on their hearts, and it would therefore be very much to be wished that some Christian artist would resolve to produce a collection of such biblical pictures at a reasonable price, if such does not already exist. J. N.

A Word of Luther's Against a False Union.

They turn the Lord's Prayer upside down, and seek first rest and peace, without regard to where the first thing—namely, God's name, kingdom, and will—is to remain. What does it mean to strain out the gnat and swallow the camel? If one wishes to seek agreement in religion, one must begin first with the fundamental articles (the chief articles, the foundational articles), namely doctrine and sacrament; once these are agreed upon, the other, external matters, which they call adiaphora (things indifferent, ceremonies), will fall into place of themselves, as has happened in our churches; then God would be present in the Concord, and rest and peace would be lasting. But where one wishes to leave the great matters standing aside and deal with the adiaphora, there God is forgotten; then a peace without God may indeed come about, in place of which one would rather suffer all manner of discord. It will indeed turn out as Christ says in Matthew 9: the new patch on an old garment makes the tear worse, and the new wine bursts the old wineskins. One must either make it entirely new, or else leave off patching, as we have done; otherwise it is all labor in vain. (Luther's Opinion, addressed to Chancellor Brück. Opp. Hal., Tom. XVII, p. 835.)

The Difference Between a Rationalist Church and a Theater.

When the rationalist Teller in Berlin once asked the theater director Iffland: how does it come about that our churches grow emptier every day, while your theaters grow fuller every day? — the latter answered: that is because you present the truth as fiction, and we present fiction as truth.

Paul, a Lutheran.

A bishop of Augsburg found the New Testament in an inn behind the table. When he opened it, his eyes fell upon the words of St. Paul, Romans 3:28: "Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law." When he read this, he said: "So, are you Lutheran too?" and flung the book onto the bench.

Comfort for Preachers and Encouragement for Hearers.

Dr. Luther was traveling through the country one Sunday, and when the bell rang for church in a village, he got down with his companions, went in, and heard the whole sermon. Afterward, on the way, they spoke of the sermon. When one of them said the pastor could have grasped the Gospel more accurately, Luther said: "Ah, when a teacher can preach Christ simply out of the Catechism, he is a blessed preacher; there were in Moses' tabernacle not only golden and silver vessels, but also vessels of copper and iron, yet they all served the eternal Son of God."

The German Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Missouri, Ohio, and Other States

will hold its next sessions in St. Louis, Mo., beginning the second Wednesday after Pentecost, from June 21 to July 1. Arriving brothers should inquire for the local pastor's residence at the establishment of Mr. L. Pechmann, dealer in German glass and porcelain wares, No. 22 Main Street, near the Old Market.

Paid.
For the 4th Volume: Messrs. Golmar, Grüninger, P. Röbbelen (4 copies).

Printed by Arthur Olshausen, publisher of the Anzeiger des Westens.