The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1933, Page 26

Transcription machine transcription, uncorrected

⤓ Download .txt · copy text

26

THE LUTHERAN PIONEER

to a chicken-shed and there found shelter for the
night. When I think of those days, my later days
seem to be days of ease and comfort.”

But we are of the opinion that the “later days”
to which this old pioneer missionary refers would
not be thought to be such very wonderful days of
ease by many others. This is what he reported in
those “later days” to the Home Mission Board of
his District about his work: “I taught school all
this week till Friday. Last Saturday I was in
Thompson, thirty miles north, to officiate at a
funeral. Yesterday morning I had services here;
in the afternoon I had services in Bohnsacktown.
At night I conducted services at Hunter, thirty
miles from home, and drove home after services.
To-day (Monday) I again taught school.” This old
pioneer worked as missionary in thirteen counties
of the State for fourteen years besides teaching
school in his home congregation and serving it faith-
fully with Word and Sacraments. Where this old
veteran worked all alone, there now are probably
a dozen pastors, serving flourishing congregations.

We fear that we of to-day, riding about in heated
automobiles over smooth roads, have no proper con-
ception of the hardships encountered by those old
pioneers of the last century. It goes without saying

. that our Church could not have grown as it did if
it had not been for the self-sacrificing labors of these
Veterans of the Cross.

Old members of the writer’s present congrega-
tion tell him that the first pastors who served them
lived sixteen miles away and that in the spring,
when the roads were practically impassable, these
ministers would walk the sixteen miles or a greater
portion of the distance in order that they might
keep their appointment. And we are sure that there
are a number of our readers who could tell of other
pastors in early days who kept their preaching ap-
pointments under similarly difficult conditions.

Do we always fully appreciate the difficulties
under which these pioneers worked, and do we
gratefully call to mind their self-sacrificing labors?

F.J.L.

A ‘‘Home Mission District.’’

Some Figures.— The State of Nebraska has
a population of 1,384,703. Of these 561,423 claim
connection with some church. 130,816 are Lu-
therans, and of these the Missouri Synod claims
57,625. In Nebraska 60 per cent. of the population
is unchurched ; in Wyoming, 73 per cent. Wyoming
_ has twenty-four counties. We are not working in

sixteen of them. Of Nebraska’s ninety-three
counties seventeen are not worked by us. We have
in the territory of the Southern Nebraska District
ten cities of more than two thousand and less than
three thousand inhabitants. We are working in but
five of them. And in our [Southern Nebraska Dis-
trict?s] part of Wyoming we have nine cities of
from two to nine thousand in which we do not
preach Luther’s doctrine pure. You see, yet there
is room for expansion and growth in the work.

Some History. — Within the last decade, mis-
sion-charges in Southern Nebraska have secured
possession of ten sectarian church-buildings in com-
munities where the work had been abandoned by the
respective denominations. With two of these prop-
erties also a parsonage was connected. In the same
time six new church properties have been acquired,
five school-buildings, and three parsonages. Re-
member, we are speaking only of mission-charges. —
As by-products of fifty years of Gospel ministry,
abundantly blessed, we call attention to the follow-
ing: With regard to the number of Christian day-
schools we lately moved up to third place among
the Districts of Synod, with a total of one hundred
twenty-five in our State. Our State has two hun-
dred forty-nine students at Synod’s colleges, being
fourth in the sisterhood of States. We are fostering
Synod’s normal college at Seward. Our Christians
maintain one home for the aged, one for orphans,
and four hospitals in this State. The Lord grant
for the future to people and leaders zeal and vigor,
vision and courage!

Present Status of District Mission Work. — We
have thirty-one parishes, forty-eight stations, and
forty-five workers. Since 1924, when the Southern
Nebraska District held its first meeting, fourteen
parishes have become self-supporting. We are now
working in nineteen parishes that were not on the
missionary map in 1924. — Southern Nebraska
District Messenger.

What the Australians are Doing for
Their Aborigines.

We found the following in a late issue of the
Australian Lutheran : —

“What have the ‘Christian’ people who came to
Australia done for the former possessors of this
country? That is a question that is to-day agitating
many minds. In Tasmania not one is left. In
Victoria there is left only a small remnant. In
New South Wales not very many of them ‘remain.