The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1933, Page 106

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106

THE LUTHERAN PIONEER

graduated in June, 1884. He entered upon his
first pastoral charge that same fall at Stuttgart,
Arkansas. After several years of faithful service
there. he accepted a call to First Church, Little
Rock. While at Little Rock, he became acquainted
with our Church’s work among the Negroes, an
acquaintance that soon grew into an interest so
intense that it never waned during subsequent years
crowded with many duties and interests.

In 1893 Pastor Miller removed to St. Paul, Min-
nesota, and became the pastor of Zion Church, and
three years later he came to Fort Wayne to become
the pastor of St. Paul’s, then and still the largest
of our congregations in that city, sharing this im-
portant pastorate for many years with his son, the
Rey. Paul F. Miller. For twenty-one years he served
as one of the General Vice-Presidents of the Mis-
souri Synod, retiring from
this position four years ago.

Missions and Christian
education loomed up big in
the eyes of Doctor Miller.
His great interest in Chris-
tian education led him to
take a great interest in
Valparaiso University and
prompted him to give this
important enterprise much
thought and time and labor.
His enthusiastic presenta-
tion of the cause of our parochial schools at synod-
ical conventions and other meetings will not be for-
gotten by those who were privileged to hear his
impassioned eloquence upon those occasions. And
with what stirring words did he not try to awaken
us to-a realization of our missionary duty! His
zeal for God’s honor, his love for his fellow-men,
his burning desire to fill others with his zeal and
love, were ever apparent.

His interests and sympathies were world-wide.
His interest in our Colored Missions has been
alluded to, but he was equally interested in our
other missionary enterprises. Home Missions had
in him a staunch promoter and supporter, and he
was equally interested in City Missions. His in-
terest in Foreign Missions was such that he thor-
oughly identified himself with it in its every phase.
As one surveys the range of Pastor Miller’s interests
and activities, one cannot but be impressed with
their variety and breadth.

Another outstanding thing about Doctor Miller
was his utter unselfishness. The one question that

Rev. J. W. Miller, D. D.

he seemed to ask himself was, What ought to be
done? And when that question was definitely
settled, it was never revised or reviewed at the bar
of the question, What should I personally like
to do? He ever tried to put his personal likes
and dislikes into the background. Had he con-
sulted more his own resources and strength, it is
possible that he might have warded off the disease
that crippled him in his later years and finally
carried him away; but with his characteristic un-
selfishness he gave all he had of reserve physical
power. He consulted what ought to be done, while
most of us consult our own inclinations. He went
out of his way to do a deed of kindness, while
most of us refrain, even when opportunity knocks
at our door. He regarded Christ and His Church
as worthy of the best service of his hand, his heart,
and his life, when many, far too many, give Him
scant thought and even less personal service. He
looked upon the world as a world that had been
redeemed by Christ and that needed to know Him,
and he knew that the preaching of the Gospel was
the only means by which humanity could be lifted
toward the Cross of the Savior. To the bringing
of this saving Gospel he gladly and freely gave
himself and his life. F. J. L.

A Chat on Our Girls at
Trivandrum, India.

The study of human nature is an interesting
subject to all of us. Children are of special interest.
Come with me to India and hear something about
the children seen in the accompanying picture.

It is a bright sunshiny Saturday morning
(March 18, 1933) at the Trivandrum Lutheran
Mission Boarding-school for Girls. I drove over
to the compound from my home, about two miles
away, to see a sick girl. At the boarding-house all
is hustle and bustle. The girls have their boxes,
in which they keep their clothes and other things,
and the straw mats on which they sleep out in the
sunshine. Some of the girls are scrubbing the floor
of their room; others are drawing water out of the
well; still ‘others are helping in the kitchen, cook-
ing, washing pots and pans, scrubbing, or cleaning,
while still others are swinging and playing. There
are at the close of the school-year twenty-three girls
in the boarding-school. At the beginning of the
school-year there were about thirty-five girls in at-
tendance.

I called the matron and the sick girl to me me