The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1927, Sheet 84

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THE LUTHERAN PIONEER.

Reclaiming Christ’s: Heritage.

XXVIII.
INSTITUTIONAL MISSION WORK.

From year to year institutional mission work is
taking on greater dimensions and for this reason is
demanding more and more attention at the hands of
the Church. Because the institutional missionary is
the herald of salvation in places to which he must be
sent from the outside, his support will always have
to come from the Church at large. It is in the very
nature of conditions that those whom the institu-
tional mission-worker serves cannot assist in his sup-
port, and this circumstance entails a permanent in-
creasein the expenses of the Church for every new

Bird’s-Eye View of Lutheran Sanitarium, Wheat Ridge, Colo.

institution it determines to serve with the Gospel of
Jesus. However, this fact should not in any way
tempt the Church to cease its institutional mission
work nor be an inducement to call a halt to its
further expansion.

It is a noteworthy fact that our institutional
mission workers are, as a rule, the most enthusiastic
of the Church’s missionaries, and this enthusiasm
can be attributed only to the blessed results they are
having and the great need of the work they are doing.

The Field of Institutional Missions.

There is probably no kind of mission-work so
multifarious as that of the institutional missionary
in one of our large cities. He finds his work in
public and private institutions, in institutions con-
trolled by city, county, State, or Federal authorities,
in penal and charitable institutions. ‘Then, too, the
work which began in a hospital, court, or prison may
be continued in the home. Among the places that

an institutional missionary’s steps lead him to are
hospitals and sanitariums, orphanages and homes
for the aged, institutes for the feeble-minded and
epileptics, as well as schools for the blind and the
deaf-mutes. Again, an institutional missionary may
spend half a day among the inmates of a reforma-
tory or prison, or he may visit a detention home or
county infirmary.

Now it may be a poor mother with several small
children who needs the missionary’s assistance be-
cause of the cruelty of the father and husband, and
at another time it may be a deceived young mother
with an illegitimate child who appeals to his sym-
pathetic help. In the latter case the young mother
must be provided with home and work, and the
child must be placed in an orphanage
or, better, in a good Lutheran home for
eventual adoption. Among the most
blessed fruits of institutional mission work
is the rescue of thousands of neglected and
delinquent children.

This morning the institutional mis-
sionary in one of our large seaports is.
called to give a friendly greeting to a
group of immigrants who have just come
to our shores, and on some other day he
may have an opportunity to direct a number
of new arrivals, so that when they reach
their final destination, they may not be at
a loss to find a church home. Many are
the needy,and pathetic cases of newcomers.
to a strange land whom the Church’s mis-
sionaries are able to care for.

Work-among Seamen.

The dangers that threaten the seaman when on
land are great. The temptations and allurements:
that beset his path are countless. No sooner does.
he set his foot on land than conscienceless male and
female wretches seek to lure him into their nets.
And, as a rule, the sailor falls an easy prey to those
that seek his money. Hungry for diversion after
weeks of privation, he is only too ready to plunge-
into the wildest excesses. It is for this reason that
the Church should give particular care to these men
of the sea, safeguard them, and provide them with
spiritual food and strength.

How blessed and important this work. among
seaman is can easily be seen from the report of the:
activities of our own seamen’s missionary in New
York. He reports having held 47 services on board
ship and 244 at the mission, with a total attendance:
of 7,515 and an average attendance of 26. In one: