The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1923, Page 42

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42

The Lutheran Pioneer.

the synodical District cannot turn over the respon-
sibility to the General Body, nor is it possible for
the General Body to impose it upon the Synodical
Conference. Upon every person in the Church and
upon the whole body rests the responsibility of ex-
ecuting the mission mandate of the Lord Jesus.
So the responsibility is shared jointly by all; cach
and every Christian, by the fact that-he is a Chris-
tian, assumes a personal burden in this matter, and
he is thereby obligated to use his abilities and means
to the uttermost if he desires to receive commenda-
tion from the lips of Him who died that we might
live and reign with Him forever.

The work of spreading Christ’s kingdom among
men must be carried on by us-unceasingly —

Through sincere and earnest labor;

Through the willing sacrifice of whatever goods

"may have been entrusted to us;

Through persistent and trusling prayer.

Thus, and thus only, will we truly learn to
recognize and prove to be true disciples of Jesus
Christ; and in performing this blessed task of
spreading the Gospel of Jesus we shall realize and
apprehend more and more the glorious purpose and
end for which the Church was founded, and for
which she continues, by God’s strength and grace,
to be maintained and to exercise her functions
throughout the earth and to the end of time.

Blessed purpose! Glorious end! Most happy
task! FJ. L.

A Pastoral Call in the Black Belt of
-Alabama.

It had not rained for some time, so we decided
to make the trip as a venture. The “pike” roads
which we usually traveled were dry and dusty, the
sun beamed upon us out of a southern sky, and
our “ever-ready” Ford was waiting to be off.

Pastor Schmidt came along, not so much for
the sake of a ride (there isn’t any pleasure in
bumping, rattling, and rolling over “Black Beltian”
roads); but he accepted my invitation because it
is always safer for two to travel together into un-
known territory, for when troublesome mud-holes
are encountered, one of them may have the pleasant
task of getting out into the mud and pushing the
_ “John Henry” along. Often enough a mud-hole

ra * which would mean getting a mule when one is
alone surrenders its victim when there is some one

_ to push. -

As we hugged through the country, we talked

“shop.” ‘To be engaged in Negro Mission work
means, | think, to discuss mission matters more and
oftener than in any other Gospel endeavor. ‘The
problems which we meet with are so peculiar, so
difficult, and so varied that our mind is always
dwelling on them. And so, when we workers get
together, you will invariably find us talking
not only mission- -conundrums, but also
sermons. ‘Thus many and many a sermon is
hatched out while we are sitting on the gasoline
tank. ‘Thus many an outline is framed, criticized,
accepted, or left to die by the wayside. Being “on
the go” so much, we have to make the most of our
time in some way, for frequently but few moments
are granted us to sit in our study.

So the time passed, and soon we were in new
parts. Unbelievable though it may sound, par-
ticularly as the roads we had left behind us were
so dusty, we ran upon a stretch of several miles
which taxed our driving skill to the utmost. Dense
woods flanked us on both sides —I would almost
call them jungles — while swamps and morass
lurked at the very edges. What a “road”! Nego-
tiate its miry depths after the skies had been weep-
ing for a week? Even horse and buggy would not
be able to make it then! As we crawled along, we
saw the implements left sticking in the mud by
others who had been here before us. Planks, studs,
boards, trees, stones— all were mute evidence of
what had happened. How we got through the
sticky stuff, I do not know. I suppose, at times,
we simply shut our eyes and plunged in. With
a sigh of relief we started to climb the hills of red
clay now heaving in sight.

When we had arrived at our destination, ‘the
top of a steep hill, we “parked” our car, took our
Boston bag, and made for the woods. If ever a
place could be called “miles from nowhere,” this
was it. Once before I had come out here, and the
man I had with me said, “This is the end of the
world,” and he himself was not living in a metrop-
olis! What a forsaken and dreary place! It didn’t

“shop,”

mission-

‘seem possible that any one could endure existence *

amid such surroundings. Yet I’ll venture to say
that, buried in these “piny woods,” hundreds of
blacks with their families are living.

In such woods we found our old Auntie. T'or-
merly she had been living on a plantation close to
Midway, one of.my stations. But because she was
so old and had no means ‘of earning a livelihood,
she went along with some of her children when
they moved away. We sat down on the porch. ‘The