The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1925, Page 53

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THE LUTHERAN PIONEER.

53

statement that the Church is doing more than, or
at least all, she ought to do in the foreign field!
Just think of it — thousands and hundreds of thou-
sands being held back every year who want to come
into the Church of Jesus Christ because the pro-
fessing followers of Jesus are not providing a suffi-
cient force of teachers to prepare these poor people
for baptism!

But what is the Christian Church doing in India
to-day? All in all, there are about 2,000 ordained
Protestant foreign missionaries, who are working
among the millions of India.

The Present Missionary Forces.

As India was the first scene of modern mission-
ary effort, so it is still that non-Christian country
which is most nearly adequately occupied by Chris-
tian missionary workers. But in spite of this fact
it has only one Christian worker for every 60,000
people and only one ordained worker for every
175,000. ‘There are about five million Christians
in India, and two-thirds of these are found in the
Madras Presidency and the native states connected
with it. It is also a noteworthy fact that one half
of the Christians speak either the Tamil or Mala-
yalam languages, the languages of only one-twelfth
of the population of India. And even in South
India, where one out of twenty is a Christian, there
are large areas that are completely destitute of a
single Christian worker. In the Bombay Presidency
there are thirty provinces unoccupied by any mis-
sion. Sindh, with its three million souls, has no
mission-stations whatever. In the district of Bihar
there are Christian workers at the rate of one
laborer for every million people. North Bengal has
one ordained missionary for every two million in-
habitants. Four large districts of Gorakhpur, with
a population of two million, have no Christian
workers. In the Central Provinces there are 50,000
villages with populations ranging from 100 to 5,000
in which the Gospel is- not regularly preached, and
many thousands in which the Gospel has never been
heard. In the Punjab the greatest spiritual desti-
tution prevails, and several districts numbering over
three million people in this section have not been
reached by the Gospel. Conservative authorities
estimate that after making the most liberal allow-
ance for the increase in the existing missionary
agencies, there are in India to-day one hundred
million people who cannot hear the Gospel-message
in their lifetime, and who, therefore, will have to
enter the dark valley of death without Christ, the
only Savior!

These millions and millions of unreached people
are calling for the Gospel; so are the 50,000,000
outcastes, whose lot is almost as pitiable as that of
slaves; so are the 6,000,000 wives under ten years
of age; so are the 40,000,000 women in the seclu-
sion and ignorance of the zenanas; so are the
27,000,000 poor and despised widows; so are the
500,000 lepers. Looking conditions fairly in the
face, we surely cannot regard it as an extravagant
estimate of the present needs of India if it is said

A Village Street in Southern India.

that it needs one male and one female mission-
worker for every 50,000 of its population. This,
however, would mean the doubling of the present
force of missionary workers.

Lutheran Missions in India.

The arrival of the Lutheran missionaries Ziegen-
balg and Pluetschau in Tranquebar, South India, in
1706, was the beginning of Lutheran missions in
India. ‘This was almost a hundred years before
Carey began his work in Bengal. Patiently these
two pioneers overcame the many obstacles in their
way, and the results they attained despite the many