The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1924, Page 7

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The Lutheran Pioneer. U

Other children were defectives, either mentally or
physically. Again, other children were orphans or
homeless. In every case proper measures for the
relief of the child in question were taken. A num-
ber of poor children were cared for, and large sup-
plies of clothing and other necessities were fur-
nished them. ‘The spiritual needs of all children
with whom we come into contact are also always
supplied as the circumstances permit, and whenever
possible, the children are connected with churches
and Sunday-schools. A number of children who
cannot attend church or Sunday-school are being
regularly supplied with Sunday-school literature,
and their mothers are encouraged to teach them
the Gospel of the Savior.”

What Rev. H. F. Wind says of the care taken by
his society holds good with regard to all of our
Lutheran home-finding societies. All that possibly
can be done to safeguard the best interests of the
child and of the prospective parents is done. All
possible efforts are made to provide a Christian
home for the wards of the societies, and everything
within reason is done to give the prospective par-
ents children such as they desire. A more practical
and more blessed and useful mission enterprise than
that of our Lutheran home-finding societies can
hardly be found. F.J.L.

A Home Mission Experience.

A Lutheran pastor relates the following story:
While pastor on the Pacific Coast, I often visited
a struggling mission in the Nahalem Valley. Along
the trail over the divide between the Columbia and
the Nahalem rivers lived two old bachelors. They
had lived in their little cabins for years trapping,
hunting, and fishing. It was a treat to stop for
rest and refreshment with the one or the other and
listen to some of the tales of the forest. One of
the old men was an Irishman. After a few visits
with them I persuaded them to accompany me into
the valley and attend my service. It was not an
elaborate service, only a simple service in the open,
where we had gathered the scattered valley folks.
After that they would always go with me until one
day I found the old Irishman in bed, awaiting his
end. He sent down to Astoria, thirty miles distant,
for the priest.

As I could apparently do nothing for him, I con-
tinued my journey into the valley. On my return

to the cabin the priest had been there and had left
again. They had not agreed on one thing. The
old man had confessed and, among other things,
had told about attending my services, etc., and he
was told that that was his most grievous sin. But
the Irishman wouldn’t have it so, and the priest
had left him without giving him the Sacrament.
I shall never forget the scene that followed. The
old dying man was lying on his hard bed, breathing
heavily. His “pal” and neighbor was sitting on a
log stool at the foot of the bed with his head bowed
and supported by his hands. “Will you kindly give
me the Sacrament?” was the appealing question.
The twilight was deepening in the cabin and in the
forest. A smoky lantern was lit and placed at the
head of the bed. A pack of timber wolves were
howling in the distance. My horse was impatiently
pawing the ground at the window, and the wind

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was moaning in the treetops overhead. The scene o}
was as weird as you possibly can imagine it. And =
there was the dying man, feverishly anxious for the wy
token of forgiveness and peace. I told him that ;
I was glad to be of service to him. Christ came 9
to seek and to save that which was lost, and I va X
seeking lost sinners to tell them of their Savior &

I told him that he had to take the Sacrament as
a Lutheran and explained the most necessary point
to him. Then he spoke the words that are vibratin
in my memory to-day, “I am willing to take m
chances with the Lutherans.” It was near midnight—}
when he received the Lord’s Supper. The longea
for peace came to his soul, and in a quiet hour o
the morning, at break of day, he passed away. We
made a crude coffin of pine branches and dug his
grave at the foot of a giant fir. His initials and
the date of his death are carved in its bark. I have
a wooden cross in my study which my old friend
made for me as an altar piece to use on my missions
to the logging camps and the settlements. It always
reminds me of the Irishman who was willing to
take his chances with the Lutherans.

cd * *

. The most impressive thing in this incident is
not the mere fact that this Irishman expressed: his
willingness to take his chances with the Lutherans,
but that he was willing to trust in the God and
Savior whom the Lutherans profess, who had been
preached to him out there in that great stillness,
where God can make Himself heard more easily,
it seems, than in the noise and turmoil of our great
cities.