# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1848 06 21_S181
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Edited by C. F. W. Walther.

Der Lutheraner.

"God's Word and Luther's teaching shall never now nor ever pass away."

Published by the German Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Missouri, Ohio, and Other States.

Volume 4.

St. Louis, Mo., July 11, 1848.

No. 23.

Terms: The Lutheraner appears once every two weeks, for the annual subscription price of one dollar for out-of-town subscribers, who must pay it in advance and bear the postage. — In St. Louis, each individual number is sold for 5 cents.

Only letters containing communications for the paper are to be sent to the editor; all others, however, containing business matters, orders, cancellations, money, etc., are to be sent here under the address: Mr. F. W. Barthel, care of C. F. W. Walther, St. Louis, Mo.

(Submitted.)
A Remarkable Example of the Power of Faith.

In the year 1676, Jürgen Frese, a godly merchant of Hamburg, published a little book against the atheists, in whose preface he relates an exceedingly remarkable occurrence from his life, testifying to the power of faith. Although this same occurrence has also been preserved for posterity by Dr. Chr. Kortholt, then living, professor at Kiel, as well as by Scriver in his "Seelenschatz" (Part I, Sermon 8, § 29) and Dr. Spener in his latest theological Bedenken (Part 3, p. 609), it must nevertheless be assumed that this "undeniable example of miracle-faith and the ensuing miraculous deed of the godly Hamburger," as the theological faculty at Kiel called it in an opinion rendered in 1685, is little known nowadays. For the strengthening of faith and the shaming of unbelief, and mindful of the word of Raphael, "The counsel and secret of kings and princes should be kept silent, but the work of God should be gloriously praised and revealed" (Tobit 12:8), we therefore renew the memory of this wondrous story, and to that end let the faith-strong Frese himself appear as narrator.

After he has related in the preface of his little book how he was placed in the citizens' prison on account of a candid accusation which he felt compelled to bring at the town hall against a person of standing; how at first he was together with several prisoners in one room, and soon had occasion to silence a mocker of the holy preaching office; how at last, by favor of the warden, he was given a separate chamber for his stay, and there, in ordering his account books, answering friendly letters, and especially in diligent and devout reading of Holy Scripture, spent the most blessed time of his life — he continues his narrative thus:

"That continued until the workhouse and house of correction burned down. Then two prisoners came there from the house of correction: one, Hans Müllenhauer, the son of a citizen of this city, and then a salt-official from Lüneburg, named Hans Jürg Witzendorf. This one was desperate, but kept himself very quiet and God-fearing for several days. Early in the morning he was very devout in his reading. Soon afterward the tide turned for him; for in January of the year 1666 he was up earlier than I. He went walking about the room, and spoke very loudly, and along with it these dreadful words: 'Where are you, you hellish spirits, that you do not come and fetch this cursed soul out of this body? Come here! Break it open, that the soul may come to you into the open air! Where are you, you hellish furies? I see that you wish to, but cannot: so I must do it myself!' Whereupon he seized a bare knife, which lay before the window, took hold of it, and wanted to thrust it into his own body. Then I sprang in to him, seized him from behind by the hands, and pressed hard upon his nose, so that he let the knife fall. Then I put it away with me. He said, 'Have you come at last?' meaning that I was Satan. I answered, 'Here I am,' tore open his coat, and took hold of it to pull it off him. This he would not allow, and said the coat was his, that he had paid for it with his own money. Whereupon I answered that he had no power to hand over a soul to Satan, for Christ Jesus had bought that soul with his blood out of the power of the hellish spirit; it was therefore not his, but belonged to heaven and not to hell. He turned to me with a savage face and asked whether I was a human being. I said, 'Yes.' He in turn said, 'Then go, or I will tear you apart, as one tears apart a young goat.' I answered him, 'You are being driven by the hellish murderer. So I will now see whether he is mightier than the King of heaven and earth, that is my dearest Jesus; he is in me and I in him.' Thereupon he seized me by both shoulders and wanted to throw me down. But I caught hold of him by his neckcloth and pulled him backward over, so that he came down flat on the ground. He was frightened at this and said, 'Now I have found my master!' I answered, 'Do not ascribe it to my strength, but to the goodness of your Lord Jesus, who loves you dearly and does not wish your soul to be lost.' Thereupon he rose up from the ground and asked whether it was possible for a man to be saved who had bound himself to a maiden with a dreadful oath, had put the same in writing to her with his own blood, but had not kept it, over which she had taken her own life, and whose spirit now stood before his eyes every night and tormented his soul. To this I answered him that I could not approve of such secret bonds; it was worse still that he had bound himself so deeply, and worse yet that he had not kept his promise; but the very worst was that he let himself be so frightened by Satan through this apparition; that was only a devil's mask, which he ought to regard as nothing; if he should fear it in the future, he would be stealing God's honor and giving it to Satan; he ought and must fear, love, and trust God above all things, day and night beg the righteous God's forgiveness for his sin with tears of repentance, and then take refuge in the open wounds of Jesus Christ, and then this hellish apparition would surely vanish. He held the opposite view and wanted to prove from Holy Scripture that he had committed a sin against the Holy Spirit which could not be forgiven him. I refuted this as far as I was able; but he was so quick to maintain his opinion from Holy Scripture that I could get nowhere with him. But I noticed the cunning of Satan, that he wove in many words which are not to be found in Holy Scripture; therefore I opened the holy Bible and looked up all the words that he cited. Then he did not want to speak further, but broke out with the following words: 'My dear friend, it...'"