# Der Lutheraner_Frankfurt am Main_September 1950_S70
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Page 70                                                    September 1950                                                    Number 9

mother, look, a caterpillar!" he suddenly cried. "Good,
kill it." "Mother-in-law, another cater-
pillar already!" "What's so special about that?" "Mother-
in-law, another one — oh mother-in-law, here's another
one!" and so it went on. This was finally too much
for the good woman, and angry and out of sorts she
went into the house — she would not be made a mockery of,

she said. But then Oberlin said to her with a serious expression:
"But, dear mother, aren't you doing the very same
thing toward God, when you speak his name
so often without seriously thinking of him? Can he
really be pleased with that?" Then she gave him her
hand and said: "You are right, dear Fritz; I will
break myself of this bad habit."

[Image: Townscape with church towers]

News from our churches

The summer semester at the Lutheran Theological
Seminary

was brought to a close on Friday, July 28, with a matins service and
an address by the current chairman of the Board of
Supervisors, Präses Heinrich Stallmann. As he
emphasized, we have particular reason,
precisely in this evil and troubled time, to be
thankful that God allowed the work of this
semester to succeed and that no serious
difficulties were able to disturb it.

The semester began in May with 38 students, of
whom some, however, were present only temporarily.
Unfortunately one of our students also fell seriously ill
while he happened to be at home, and had to give up the rest
of the semester. We hope, however, that he will be able to
take part again in the winter semester. Our two
Americans from the Wisconsin Synod intend to
leave us again after a year of study. They are even
taking two of our students with them, who
will in turn spend a year studying at the Theological
Seminary of the Wisconsin Synod in Thiensville, Wis.,
and later wish to serve in the refugee mission
church. Four students are preparing for
their first examination, which they intend to take in September before
the examination commission of our churches. One
candidate wishes to take a supplementary examination,
another is coming up for his second examination. In the spring, God willing, an even
larger number of candidates will follow.

Among the special events of the summer, the most
important for the academic life of the institution were first of all
a series of guest lectures and talks. Thus
Pastor Hopf spoke for several hours
on the mission to the heathen, and one of the doctors of the
nearby "Hohemark" sanatorium spoke on neurosis
research as a means of understanding the human being.

We have also had various other visits. We
mention Professors A. Gübert of Edmonton,
Canada, and Gehrke of Watertown, Wis.
The American Bad Boll Commission was
just among us (the first Vice-Präses of the Missouri
Synod, Dr. Hermann Harms, Professors Dr.
J. T. Mueller and Dr. Spitz of St. Louis,
Prof. M. J. Naumann of Springfield, Prof.
Theo. Nickel of Valparaiso University, Präses
Roschke of the Western District). These were
lovely hours which we were able to spend with our dear
guests in splendid weather. The faculty
hopes to meet the gentlemen of the commission again during their
stay in Germany, for a more thorough discussion. A great joy of
an unusual kind was a congregational visit from northern Germany,
from the congregation of Brunsbrock near Verden/Aller,
which brought a whole busload of congregation members
with their trombone choir to us while passing through on
their way to Frankfurt, and showed us that our
institution has a place in the hearts of our congregations.

A festive high point was the mission festival
of the seminary on Sunday, June 25, to which we
had invited the surrounding congregations of all our churches
and which had an unexpectedly strong
attendance. There may have been as many as 500 visitors
present, some of whom had come from far away,
even from Stuttgart, and who were not deterred in their
festive joy even by the heavy downpour in the
afternoon. Our readers have already been informed
of the details of this festival in the
last issue.

But even though festivals are high points, they
are not the center of the semester. At the center
stands the work, the preparation for the high goal,
the readying for the holy office of the church. And for that
this semester too has required all the strength
that instructors and students could muster,
all the more since our work still has, in one respect
or another, certain initial difficulties
to overcome. But precisely for that reason we warmly
welcomed the fact that, not least through the energetic
effort of our legal advisor Dr. Eisenberg
in Hanau, who is also a member of the administrative
committee of the seminary, our Lutheran Theological
Seminary has now also received official
recognition as an institution of higher education by the
state of Hesse under the usual conditions. While this
significance, especially for the inner life of our church
work, should not be overestimated, it is nevertheless
connected with a whole series of legal
advantages that will in this way benefit
our work and our students.

Now our semester vacation has begun. Some
of the students have departed. Others have
stayed here in order to earn, through the still necessary
work on the property, the means for
continuing their studies. Others are quietly preparing
for their examinations. Our attention now turns
to the coming winter semester, for which
the lecture schedules are already fixed and for which we
must now again prepare ourselves with all our strength. May
God's protection and blessing continue to rest
upon all our undertakings! Kirsten.

A mission festival of the Lutheran free church in Bavaria

The congregations of our free Lutheran churches
were permitted, over the course of this summer, to experience such a great number
of church festivals that it is impossible
to report on every celebration in "Der Lutheraner." I am
all the more grateful, therefore, that I may tell fellow believers
a little about a day of great joy
that was given to us on July 9, 1950: the
mission festival in Claffheim near Ansbach. There, for a
joint celebration, met the Ansbach St. Luke's
congregation of the ev.-Luth. Free Church, the
Mühlhausen congregation of the independent ev.-Luth. Church
newly formed through resistance
against joining the EKidD, seven young theologians
currently studying in Erlangen from various Lutheran free
churches, and in addition
a number of members of the ev.-Luth. Church of
Old Prussia, who live in Bavaria as displaced persons
in great dispersion and some of whom had traveled
very long distances in order to
take part in our festival — altogether a festival
congregation of nearly a hundred people, all of whom
experience and suffer what it means to remain
unbreakably faithful to the Lutheran church on
"lonely paths" and to resist the unionism
of their surroundings. We were guests of a farm,
where the only free-church family in the village
received all of us with heartfelt love. Supported by
congregation members from the neighboring villages, our
hosts had provided for everything in the best way.
In the grassy garden behind the house a beautiful
festival ground with pulpit and altar had been prepared,
directly bordering meadows and rich harvest fields. Favored
by glorious weather, surrounded by holiday
stillness, made happy by the fellowship of fellow
believers, we were permitted to celebrate at this beautiful
place — on the ground of the old "South German ev.-
Luth. Free Church," which had already come into being 79 years
earlier, when near Ansbach the young curate
Andreas Hörger was removed from office by the
Bavarian church government of that time because he had
practiced church discipline according to God's word. The festival
sermon was given by Consistorial Councillor Dr. Günther (Wuppertal-Elber-
feld), the president of the supreme church council of the ev.-
Luth. Church of Old Prussia, whose service in our
midst clearly demonstrated that the oldest and
largest of the German Lutheran free churches emphatically
confesses itself also in Bavaria to the often
contested free-church outposts. On the basis
of the Sunday Gospel of Peter's catch of fish (Luke 5),
he showed us in what way we become capable of mission. After
a brief word of greeting, I then gave the
festival congregation a report on the mission work in
South Africa, which was begun in 1892 by the Hanoverian
ev.-Luth. Free Church and will now also be the mission
for other Lutheran free churches, in which we wish to work together
in shared responsibility.
In the afternoon service, Deacon
Junker (Veitsbronn) spoke first, the tireless caretaker of
the members of the ev.-Luth. Church in Prussia
scattered throughout Bavaria. He expounded a verse
from the Gospel of Jesus' entry into Jerusalem as
a parable and guidance for the missionary
action of the church: "Go into the village
that lies before you...!" Then three young men
from the Ansbach congregation greeted us with poems, in which
a strong call to manly steadfastness and grateful
faithfulness on the path of the Lutheran confessional church
resounded. Consistorial Councillor Dr. Günther told
of the history of the Lutheran church in Prussia, especially of
the shattering yet so comforting experiences
of the last five years. In the closing sermon
on Romans 5:20, I pointed to the two words in
which everything lies that moves the world and that
we need to recognize: sin and grace. Here also lies
the standard for right judgment amid all
the confusion of Christendom as well as for the self-examination
of our Lutheran free churches; here we find the testimony
that we owe to the world in this deeply troubled
time. Our festival closed — as our great
Mühlhausen mission festivals once did — with a
special high point. In the morning we had intoned the
Te Deum as our church prayer. Now we were once
more united as a praying congregation: we sang "All
Glory Be to God on High" (verses 1—4) and then
brought everything before our Lord in three prayers, each
introduced by a versicle and closed with a sung
"Amen": thanksgiving for the course of the Gospel —
intercession for church, mission, people,
fatherland — and finally the Emmaus petition of Christendom:
Lord, abide with us — in the evening of the
day, in the evening of life, in the evening of the
world!

F. W. Hopf, Nackendorf

From the congregations of the Ev.-Luth. Church of Old Prussia

Pastoral Conference of the Thuringian-Saxon Diocese

In Gotha we held our
this year's pastoral conference from June 13—15. On the evening of the first
conference day we celebrated our conference
service, in which Pastor Gasde gave us the confessional
address on Luke 12:49 and Pastor Kersten from Weissenfels
preached the sermon on Matthew 9:35—38. The church
choir adorned our service most beautifully with three
hymns. It was a heartfelt
joy for all the brethren in office to experience this
service in our beautiful, new Church of the Cross. How thankful the
congregation may be that God the Lord allowed her
to succeed, in this difficult time, in building such a
splendid little church! On Wednesday afternoon we entered
into the actual proceedings of our conference.
The superintendent opened with a devotion on
Acts 9:15 and 16. He gave an overview and
warmly welcomed Pastor Kersten of Weissenfels, who
was taking part in a conference for the first time as a member of our
diocese. After that, Pastor Martin Nagel
of Arnstadt offered an exegesis of I Peter 4:12—19,
with a practical focus on the question: "What does
this pericope say especially to us who hold office?" A
lively discussion was sparked by Pastor Biehler's paper on
the theme: "What wishes do we have regarding the new
hymnal of our churches?" Since decisions must be
made here that will hold for decades,
careful preparatory work must be done.
Above all, it matters greatly to us that the
connection between East and West be preserved. Therefore we
expect that the hymnal commission will not
meet only in the West and make decisions only in the West,