The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1928, Page 190

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190 THE LUTHERAN PIONEER.

of the American Church. They found it very difli-
cult, however, to convince the native Christians as
they were afraid of being cast off to sink or swim.

Then it was that a native pastor arose and made

this appeal to his fellow-Christians. Taking an egg, -

he said: “You see, if I try to stand this egg on end,
it will topple over, but if I put an egg-cup under it”
(he suited the action to the words), “it stands up-
right. Now, we are just like this egg. When we
were not able to stand alone, the American Church
supported us. But the time has now come when the
egg-cup must be taken away. Let me tell you, then,
how we must stand on our own feet.” He then
tapped the one end of the egg on the desk and broke
the shell a little, thus flattening it. “Now you see,
when the shell is crushed a little, the-egg is able to
stand alone. So we must break a little of our shell
of selfishness and give more for the Lord’s work.”
Then changing his illustration, he continued:
“We are like the egg in another way. You know
what would happen if a hen were to sit on a good
egg. About three weeks later a chicken would come
out of the egg, self-supporting, self-governing, and
self-propagating. It would have to be mothered by
the hen for a little while, but in a few weeks it
would be off for itself. So we have been mothered
now for a long time by the American Church, but
it is time that we should scratch for ourselves and
thus become independent of the mother Church.”
Then he appealed to his native audience to vote
for a policy of self-support. His arguments were so
conclusive and his personality so strong that the
* last doubter was won, and an enthusiastic and
unanimous vote was given to do as the native pastor
suggested. =

A ‘Navajo on the New Trail.

To a missionary at Tuba, Ariz., on the Navajo
Reservation, a hundred miles from civilization,
came an aged man some years ago. He had been
attending Sunday services and in his deliberate
way had now arrived at a conclusion regarding the
message of “the Book” which he had heard and
pondered. ‘These were his words through the
interpreter as he announced to the “Sunday man”

_ his conversion: “Tell the Sunday man I am done
with the old worship of the coyote, the rattlesnake,
the bat, and the owl [the four things that the
Navajos hold in superstitious fear]. I am ready to
take the “Jesus road.? And I have come a long

_ way over the trail to-day to learn more of the
| new road.”

This gray-haired Indian, just taking his first
steps on the new trail, had yet much to learn, but
the change was already great, even in the eyes of
men. Faith in the old superstition was destroyed,
hope and trust in Christ and His Gospel had taken
its place; he had passed from death to life.

A True Missionary Story
in Seven Chapters.

Chapter one. An open-air preaching scene where
a humble worker of the Pilgrims’ Mission daily tes-
tifies to the good news of salvation, and that Jesus
Christ is his Savior and Helper.

Chapter two. One of those who has been in the
audience in the street and has been daily listening
to the Christian preacher becomes angry and one
day, stirred up by the devil, catches the preacher by
the throat, gives him a beating, and asks him
tauntingly, “Ask your Jesus to save you from this
beating and to help you.”

Chapter three. The heathen, or non-Christian,
audience, seeing the poor Christian being beaten,
voluntarily comes to his help and prevents his being
abused any more.

Chapler four. After. the beating the preacher
prays for his enemy.

Chapter five. Next day the enemy comes to the
preacher and asks for forgiveness, bringing several
with him.

Chapler six. The day after this the “enemy”
comes to the very place where the preacher is again
preaching Christ and openly asks the preacher to
forgive him and confesses to all that he “did wrong.”

Chapter seven. The former enemy is now the
warm friend and helper of the preacher and comes
daily to listen appreciatively to the Gospel. The
preacher says: “See how Jesus did help me.”

Can’t Some One Get Him In?

A mother came to the pastor with a pitiful story
of a boy gone wrong, appealing to the preacher to
do something. “I should like to see you get him
into the church,” she said. ;

“Yes,” said the preacher, “I should like to see
some one get him into the church.”

For seventeen years this mother has been
mothering this boy. In all that time she has never
been a member of the church or even a regular

attendant at the services in the house of God. She ~