The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1927, Page 63

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THE LUTHERAN PIONEER.

63

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A Severe Accusation.

Without wishing to subscribe to every word of
the following statement, we yet bring it because of
the heart-searching it may do among readers : —

“Many a noble minister’s heart aches with
a sense of utter loneliness in service. He had hoped
that a group of lay officials in his church would
respond heartily to his appeal for spiritual co-
operation in the saving ministries of the church,
only to find he was dealing with a considerable
number of baptized pagans instead of New Tes-
tament Christians.”

This striking statement is from the pen of
Bishop Theodore S. Henderson of the Methodist
Episcopal Church and appeared recently in the
Weslern Christian Advocate.

It suggests a process of heart-searching thought
to every church-member. Do you as a layman give
your minister the support in the spiritual work of
the church that he has the right to expect? Do you
recognize your responsibilities as a church-member
in forwarding the fundamental purposes of the
church as keenly as you recognize your duties in
club and business? What new responsibilities did
you take upon yourself, anyhow, when you made
the decisive step of becoming a church-member?
How faithful have you been to duty?

Bishop Henderson, it is true, somewhat softens
his blow by adding that spiritually minded and
sacrificially disposed laymen are not to be found
ready-made, but that it is the duty of the pastor to
develop them. He points out to the ministers that
“it was necessary for Christ to take both time and
training to develop His group of laymen.”

One might go farther, however, and suggest that
every layman ask himself: “How would the Chris-
tian Church have developed had those original lay-
men of Christ’s been no more devoted workers
‘than 1?”

Trash.

Under this heading Pastor Linnemeier, of North
Judson, Ind., brings some very wholesome things in
his parish paper, Good News. Some of our readers
will probably find his language a little strong; but
some things have to be said in virile tones: —

“When the Lutheran Church began to preach
English, it also began going out and getting many
people who were not ‘raised in the Church,’ people
who had no Christian background of religious
training in infancy, childhood, and youth: We

cannot expect that these people all at once will have
the same high standards of religion as those whom
we have had from childhood on (though experience
shows that very often it does not take them long
to outdo some of us).

“Now, then, when we gain such people, too
many of us all of a sudden expect too much of
them. In fact, we are inclined to call them ‘trash.’

“That’s sad. In the sight of God either all men
are trash, including also the best-trained Lutherans,
or, looked at from another angle, not a single person
is trash. Trash we are, and all of us, when God
looks at our good works. Why, the very best of us
have to admit that our very righteousnesses are
‘filthy rags,” and all must beg God not to enter into
judgment with them because in His sight no living
man shall be justified. But if God looks at men
through the work of Christ, there is not a single
one who can be called trash. How can or dare any
of us have the heart to call that trash for which
God himself poured out His blood? In that sense
the most despicable, detestable, vile, filthy wretches
are precious in God’s sight, and if precious to Him,
how dare they be trash to us, particularly such as
are not merely redeemed by the blood of Christ, but
have also confessed that they believe in Christ as
their Savior?

“Among the many things that are wrong with
some Lutherans this is one: What in all these
many years was done and given to us by God’s grace,
that we were inclined to ascribe to owr merit. Ah,
I tell you, unless in sackcloth and ashes we repent
of our wickedness, God will yet cast us aside and
build His Church with what we delight to call
‘trash.’ ”

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BOOK TABLE.

Faith Unshaken. By John Th. Mueller. Concordia Pub-
lishing House, St. Louis, Mo. 100 pages. Price:
Cloth, 85 cts.; flexible paper covers, 50 cts.

Here is a popular handbook of Christian Evidences.
Its design is to prove that the Christian religion is true
and that it has a supernatural, divine origin and sanc-
tion; that Christianity is not one of many religions, but
the absolute, the only true religion; and that Christianity,
in distinction from all other, man-made religions, is a rev-
elation from God. One outstanding virtue of the book is
that it is written in such simple language and its man-
ner of presentation is so lucid that the average Christian
reader will have no difficulty in following the author.

Outlines for Catecheses and The Technique of Ques-
tioning. By H. B. Fehner, M. A. Concordia Pub-
lishing House, St. Louis, Mo. Cloth binding. 180
pages. Price, $1.25, less the usual discount.

These Outlines have been tried out in the schoolroom.
As we understand it, the author’s students used these
Outlines as the basis for the catecheses which they held
in the training-school of our Seward Normal. How the