The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1922, Page 53

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The Lutheran Pioneer.

53

A Testimony.

Selma, Ala., March 28, 1922.
Drar Rey. LANKENAU : —
Mayhap you can use this letter for the PionEER.
It comes from one of our this year’s catechumens
on the Alabama field. —

“Dear Rev. Scumipr: —

“J was asked by my father on the 14th day of
March why I want to join the Lutheran Church.
He wanted to know what I found in the Lutheran
Church which would cause me to leave the
Church just to be a Lutheran.

“T told him: I have lived in the Church
eight years, and the pastors did not teach the true
Gospel. The: Lutheran Church has taught me to
read my Bible. In reading the Bible I found that
I had been deceived and was blind to the real truth.
I had never learned the true answer to the question:
What must I do to be saved?

“The preachers told me to ‘get religion’ by
praying. They said I must go into the woods and
fields at night and pray until I had become con-
verted. So I prayed and even went into the woods,
but I did not get any ‘religion.’

“But when I came to the Lutheran Church, the
pastors and teachers taught me to believe in Jesus.
By going to the Lutheran Church, sitting down
there quietly and hearing God’s Word, the Spirit of
God worked faith in my heart. Now I am con-
verted, trusting in Jesus for salvation.

“And now I am a Christian, not believing in
Luther, but in Jesus. But I am not ashamed to
call myself a Lutheran, and shall remain a Lutheran
until I die.

“This is what I told my father when he asked

me why I wanted to join the Lutheran Church.
it4 »

This little note shows the great darkness, spir-
itual darkness, in-which the people live down here,
it shows how many who have learned to know and
Jove the Lutheran Church meet with opposition on
the part of friends and relatives when they want to
join the Lutheran Church, and it also shows clearly
how some, in spite of such opposition and even per-
secution, will take a stand for Christ and our dear
Church, which points the way to heaven through the
blood of Christ, and faith in that blood.

Yours very truly,
G. A. ScHmipt.

Do. Missions Pay?

An old gentleman living in a quiet Eastern vil-
lage had a visit — the first in many years — from
his son, a prosperous storekeeper in Western Canada.
On Sunday father and son went to church, where
they listened to a sermon on Christian missions.
Throughout the service the old gentleman was
restless.

“T’m sorry,” he said, as they left the church,
“that I brought you here to-day.”

“Why, father?” asked the younger man.

“I’m sorry,” he replied, with a shrug of his
shoulders, “that you had to listen to that sermon.
I don’t believe in missions. They are a stupid waste
of men and money.”

The younger man made no reply at the time, but
when he reached home, he asked his father and
mother to let him tell them a little story.

“A few years ago,” he began, “a young man left
his father’s farm to seek his fortune in the Canadian
West. He got into bad company and was left one
day by the roadside, drunk and unconscious.

“At that place, living in a little sod-covered
shack, there was a young man who had been sent
out by a missionary society. He was brave. He
loved men and sought them in the spirit of his
divine Master. He found the drunken fellow, who
had been left by his companions to die from alcohol
or exposure, and carried him to his shack, placed
him in his own bed, and worked over him until he
brought him back to consciousness. Then after he
had fed him, he remonstrated with him for wasting
his life, and prayed earnestly with him.

“Father and mother, I am that man, and
I tremble to think what I should have been but
for that faithful missionary.”

Not Too Much for an Indian.

An Jndian one day asked Bishop Whipple to
give him two one-dollar bills for a two-dollar note.
The bishop asked, “Why?” He said, “One dollar
for me to give Jesus, and one dollar for my wife to
give.” ‘The bishop asked him if it was all the money
he had. He said, “Yes.” ‘The bishop was about to
tell him, “It is too much,” when an Indian clergy-
man, who was standing by, whispered, “It might be
too much for a white man to give, but not too much
for an Indian who has this year heard for the first
time of the love of Jesus.” — The Christian.