# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1944_S388
# Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

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38 8 Miscellaneous Matters

2) This great war and postwar job cannot be done by boar
‘or committees alone. It must be done by the rank and file: o
our whole Church. It must be conceived as the great war an
postwar job of every individual member of our Church. Today:
there are more than sixty-seven million’:
The Whole Church unchurched people in the United States:
at Work that belong to neither Catholic nor”
\ Protestant nor Jewish nor Lutheran ;
churches. They live “without God and without hope in the.
world.” Today there are twenty-six million more such people.
_ in the United States than forty years ago. God is using this war °
to make many people humble and thoughtful and to help them.
sense their need of God as they never have before. Every fol-.
lower of Christ in the Missouri Synod must, by virtue of his:
membership in the body of Christ, take part in the harvest.”
Many ‘of the members of the Missouri Synod have forgotten «
this. This creates a situation which threatens the very life of:
our churches. And our Council believes it to be a part of its -
functions to challenge the membership of our churches and our *
pastors and teachers to’ undertake to. win more people for
Christ ~ beginning now. : :
3) There is the problem of the returning soldier who must::
~ be re-integrated into congregational life. This is a large and “
. more complex problem than most people realize. Even now the .
military branches of our Government are releas-
Returning ing an average of 75,000 men a month. There =;
Servicemen is a special committee at work preparing a.:
brochure for guidance to our congregations on *:
this problem. ~ It has been said that after the last world war the.’
Church let the returning soldier down. The Church has been: .
accused of falling down on the job of lifting up spiritually those
who needed it most during thé years of depression. Pray God
that He will lend us wisdom and understanding and action in
_Meeting the spiritual and physical and social needs of our men
and women as they come back to us. ,

4) China after the war will, we pray, present a new
China world to conquer for Christ. A gallant group of our
; Chinese and American mission workers is doing heroic
work comparable to that of any in mission history. Not so many
decades ago a similar opportunity presented itself to the Chris-
tian Church in Japan. Our Church at that time was not pre-.