The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1897, Page 36

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36 The Lutheran Pioneer.

The Outlook from the Editor’s Window.

—From the annual report of our Ev. Luth.
Orphans’ Home at Addison, IIl., we learn that
101 children were taken care of during the
past year. The Home will this year celebrate
its twenty-fifth anniversary. May God con-
tinue to bless its labor of love.

—A Lonpon preacher, whose custom it is

. to receive the offerings from the deacons and,

placing them upon the altar, ask the Lord’s
acceptance and blessing, once received a let-
ter containing five shillings. The writer stated
that when the preacher prayed for a blessing
upon the two pence (four cents) he had dropped
into the box, he felt so ashamed that he now
sent five shillings instead. If every member
who has cause to feel ashamed were to send
such conscience letters to the pastor, his cor-
respondence would increase enormously—and
our benevolent contributions likewise.

—A SERVANT-GIRL belonging to the Swed-
ish Lutheran church at San Francisco, Cal.,
came recently to the pastor with $20 for for-
eign missions. She said that the Lord had
blessed her spiritually so that she felt that she
must give that sum for the spreading of His
kingdom. What she could she did.

— 634,025 Brees were sent to foreign parts
by the American Bible Society last year, and
more copies sent to China than in any previ-

ous year. The entrance of Thy Word giveth

light.

—WuenN the great missionary among the
heathen, Christian Schwartz, had finished his
studies at Halle, he resolved to consecrate his
life to the service of God. On learning that
Prof. Francke wished to obtain new mission-
aries for India, he at once longed to be one
of them, and to go to work in that far-off, be-
nighted country. He set out for his native
village to obtain the consent of his father.
His father had shortly before this time buried
a son and given his oldest daughter in mar-
riage. It must have been a hard question for
his father to decide when young Schwartz
asked if he might go to India and spend his
life there as a missionary. But that father

‘was a godfearing man. He repaired to his

chamber to pray over the matter. At length
he came down, gave the son his blessing, and
bade him depart in God’s name. He charged
him to forget his native country and his fa-
ther’s house, and to go and win souls for
Christ.

—Tuenre are about 1100 American mission-
aries in China representing the Protestant
churches of the United States.

—Tue people of Uganda in Africa now
spend hundreds of pounds yearly in the pur-
chase of New Testaments, Gospels, and Chris-
tian literature.

_ —<A missionary, in his report as to the field
of his labor, says: ‘‘Methinks one reading
this report says, ‘Well, I will give five dollars

_ tothe cause of domestic missions. I can give
_ this amount and not feel it.’ Suppose, my

Christian brother, you give twenty, and feel
it. Your Saviour felt what He did for you.
A remark of this kind once heard from the
pulpit, thrilled through my whole soul, and
made me do more than empty my purse, I
borrowed from a friend.’’

— Tne China Inland Mission has now been
operating thirty-two years in China. From a
summary of its work published by the Mfis-
sionary Review of the World, it appears that
when the work first began, only two of the in-
land provinces were open to Christian work-
ers. Now, largely through its service, only
two are in any sense closed. About 260 sta-
tions and out-stations have been established,
and there are 342 native helpers, working to-
gether with nearly 700 missionaries. There
are in connection with mission churches about
5000 persons. Over 8000 have been baptized,
and Dr. J. Hudson Taylor has recently esti-
mated that between 15,000 and 20,000 men
and women have been brought to the Lord
through the instrumentality of the mission
workers.

—Tue Evangelical Africa Society has bought
large tracts of land in the hill district of Usam-
bara in German East Africa in order to settle
there freed slaves and to make farmers of
them, an occupation for which the negro is
suited best. Dr. von Bodelschwingh at Biele-
feld is the president of the society, and the
white men acting as colonizers are from the
Bielefeld Inner Mission Institutions.

—Tne question is frequently asked, ‘‘Do
Missions pay?’’ Yes. Aside from the relig-
ious character of missions, let us take a utili-
tarian view. When the Hermannsburger Mis-
sionaries first went to Natal, Africa, they found
the natives as filthy as their swine. They per-
suaded them into seeing that ‘‘cleanliness is
next to godliness.”” They got them to white-
wash their huts inside and out as the first
thing. Next the enclosures and pig-sties
were whitewashed, and the effect was so pleas-
ing to the natives that finally the pigs them-
selves had to undergo the whitewashing pro-
cess. This one instance goes to show that
Christianity as a moral force is one of the
principal factors in producing what we com-
monly and correctly call Christian civilization.

—Ir is hard to believe that at this time
“Fifty Millions of Slaves are still groaning
under the Jash of brutal slave-masters, and
that half a million lives are annually sacri-
ficed to Africa’s Internal Slave Trade.’’ But
we are told that this is the astounding fact,
from a thorough and careful study of the sub-
ject made by intelligent explorers and men
of science, well known to the world. This in-
famous trade is carried on by Arabs, Moham-
medans and pagan natives. It so oppressed
the mind of Livingstone that, among his last
words, he wrote: ‘*‘All I can add in my soli-
tude is, may Heayen’s rich blessings come
down on eyeryone—American, English, or
Turk—who will help to heal this Open Sore of
the World.’” These words of his are carved

on his monument in Westminster Abbey. To
the overthrow of this traflic Mr. Heli Chate-
lain, of Switzerland, but a naturalized citizen
of the United States, has consecrated his life,
and, with a small band of equally devoted
comrades, left this country for Africa. They
have gone out under the auspices of the Phil-
african League, which will avail itself of the
Brussels act of 1892, obligating the European
powers to repress the slave trade and rum
traflic and aid all scientific, philanthropic and
missionary enterprises. The plan is to estab-
lish permanent stations here and there as
cities of refuge for the victims of the barbaric
slave trade to become centers of civilization
and thus helpful toward the permanent re-
demption of the dark continent.

—A PATHETIC sToRyY that comes from China
gives an illustration of how medical missions
prepare the way for the advance of Christi-
anity. A military graduate was successfully
treated for cataract at the mission hospital in
Hankow. As he returned to his home, forty-
eight other blind men gathered about him and
begged him to lead them to the wonderful for-
eign doctor. So this strange procession of
blind men, each holding on to the others’ rope,
walked for 250 miles to Hankow, and nearly
all were cured. One who could not be cured,
received while in the hospital the better gifts
of spiritual healing.

Evangelical Lutheran Colored Churches,
New OR.tEans, La.

EV. LUTH. ST. PAUL’S CHAPEL.
1625 Annette Str., between Claiborne and Derbigny.
Divine services: Sunday morning at yA o’clock.
Sunday evening at 734 o'clock.
Wednesday evening at 744 o'clock.
Sunday School: Sunday morning at 1034 o'clock.
Adult eee class mects at 734 o’clock Tuesday
evening.
* Singing School meets at 734 o'clock Monday evening.

EV. LUTH. MT. ZION CHURCH.
Cor, Franklin and Thalia Strs.
Divine services: Sunday morning at 11 o'clock.
Sunday evening at 734 o'clock.
Thureday evening at 74 o’clock.
Adult catechumen class mects at 734 o'clock Friday

evening.
Young Peoples’ Concordia Circle meets at 7} o'clock
evening. F, J. LANKENAU, Missionary.

EV. LUTH. BETHLEHEM CHAPEL.
Cor. Washington Avenue and Dryades Str.
Divine services at 73 o'clock Sunday cyening and at 7}
o’clock Thursday evening.
Sunday School at 9 o'clock.
J. W. F. Ko8sMANN, Missionary.
Sl tates Prorat eo

Ey. Luth. Holy Trinity Church.

Springfeld, Ill.
Divine Services at half past 10 o’clock Sunday morning
and at 8 o'clock Sunday evening.
Sunday School at 3 o'clock Pr. M.
Oatechumen class mects Monday and Friday evenings.
Singing-school Tucsday evening.
| RS

TERMS:

Tae LurneraNn Pioneer is published monthly,
payable in advance at the following rates, postage
included, owt

50 a ois Hera 19.
Club rates only allowed if all copies are to be sent
to one address.
All business communications to be addressed to
“Concordia Publishing House,” St. Louis, Mo.
All communications concerning the editorial de-
ent to be addressed to Prof. R. A. BiscHOFr,
mcordia College, Fort Wayne, Ind.