The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1932, Page 186

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186

THE LUTHERAN PIONEER

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reports of the increased successes in the field would
hearten the Christians to put forth ever greater
efforts to spread the saving knowledge of the Savior.

Experience shows that ignorance of an endeavor
and its successes is the main cause of indifference
towards it. So it is also with missions. Those who
read about missions and their successes will be in-
terested in missions; for they see God’s hands in it
all and rejoice at having the privilege of helping
God in the glorious work of saving immortal souls.

We therefore appeal, first of all, to you, dear
brethren in office, pastors and teachers, to help us
increase the number of readers of our Missionstaube
and PIoNEER. You will find that these papers will
help you to train friends of missions in your con-
gregations. The more readers of the Missionstaube
and the PIoNEER you have in your congregation, the
more mission-minded members you will have.

F.J.L.
Christmas in China.
DEAR FRIENDS: —

The blessed Christmas Festival is again a thing
of the past. Our Christmas here in Wanhsien was
indeed a blessed and happy one. In some respects
we no doubt had more joy at this time than you.
We shall give you a brief description of how Christ-
mas was celebrated here in Wanhsien.

About a week before Christmas our Christians
bought two nice trees and quite a bit of evergreen
and some bamboo. With the bamboo they made
various arches and then covered them with the ever-
green. This looked very pretty. They also made
a large arch for our gate. Besides the arches and
a nice Christmas-tree they had quite a few paper
streamers in the chapel. Though these decorations
are different from what you have, they nevertheless
are very nice.

Christmas Eve service had been announced for
7.30. About at 7 o’clock some of the schoolgirls
came over to escort the ladies to the church. Rev. S.
and I also went over shortly after. When we ar-
rived at the chapel, we found the seats already filled,
and extra benches had to be placed. When the ser-
vice started, more than two hundred people were
present. The service was conducted just like at
home — a hymn, Scripture-reading, well-known
hymns by the children, led by the student and ac-
companied by myself at the organ. ‘The various
questions were asked by the evangelist, and a short
_ sermon was preached by Rev. S. It was indeed sur-
| prising to see such good order throughout the whole

service. At the close of it the children received their
gifts, first the schoolchildren and then all the other
children that were present. When the latter got
their little bags, this almost caused a stampede.
The women with their little children were deter-
mined to get there first; some of them even tried
to come for the second time.

After the services we had our own celebration at
home. First we sang Christmas hymns and read the
Christmas Gospel, and then we distributed our gifts.
The tree which we have this year is much nicer than
the one we had last year.

On Christmas Day we again had services, and to
our surprise the chapel was again more than filled.
The evangelist took advantage of this opportunity,
for he preached about an hour. Some parts of his
sermon he repeated because the people kept coming
in throughout the service. No one attending that
service will be able to say that he was not shown the
way to salvation. After the service candies, tea, and
cookies were given to each one who had attended
the service. This custom the local congregation ob-
serves every year.

Upon arriving home from this service, we found
a nice three-course turkey dinner awaiting us. This
is more than we have ever expected in China. To
make it still better, we received quite a bit of Amer-
ican mail during the course of the meal. Before we
had finished eating, the evangelist and the student
arrived to pay their respects. We had a very en-
joyable afternoon with them; they especially en-
joyed hearing the Christmas records on the phono-
graph which we played for them.

On Second Christmas Day we entertained the
schoolchildren. We had asked them to come at three
o’clock. Shortly before three they announced them-
selves by singing a hymn in front of the compound
gate. Then, accompanied by the evangelist and the
student, they entered the compound and marched
to the front door at Rev. S.’s place, where they sang
ahymn. Then they came to our place and sang for
us and finally also for Miss C. at her front door.
Then they were ready to come in. We had lit the
candles on the Christmas-tree for them; so, upon
entering the house, they all joined in singing
“Silent Night, Holy Night.” After they were all
seated, we played some Christmas records for them,
which they all seemed to enjoy very much. Then
we began to hand round the “eats.” It was a great
pleasure to see how they enjoyed them. It was
greatly amusing to hear the forty children eating
peanuts at one time. They also received cookies,