# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1851 07 22_S191
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

191

a more hideous shape than in this beautiful little land, where death and indifference seemed greater than there! And precisely there God's Word and Luther's doctrine have found a mighty echo. Pastor Brunn in Steeden, a village in the beautiful Lahn valley, is the little grain of wheat which there brings forth a hundred- and thousandfold fruit. Already there are in Nassau three new Lutheran congregations, at Steeden, at Anspach in the district of Usingen, and at Gmünden in the Westerburg country. And still the movement seems not to stand still, but spreads further, however much the world is full of astonishment and would fain resist it. — A mighty movement, proceeding from younger clergymen, we perceive also in the Grand Duchy of Hesse. To be sure, it has not yet come to the forming of new congregations, but one wrestles with youthful strength toward the new birth, and the gracious blessing of the LORD will not fail. Only read the Hessian Kirchenblatt, and tell us a second, in which with equally strong blows helmet and target of unbelief and of unchurchly ways are smitten! — In poor, rent Baden, where the Union formula denies the existence of a Lutheran as well as of a Reformed Church, where no petition for the restoration of the Lutheran Church is any longer received, there is at least a morning star of improvement, however night-dark the sky of the Church may still be overcast. The first-fruit — for surely he will not be the only one — Pastor Eichhorn at Nußloch near Heidelberg, an unblemished and faithful servant of God, driven by God's Word and his conscience, has gone out from the fetters of the Union, and has ventured what yet more than one ought to venture, yea, ought to do with joy, without any sense of the hazard. — And who would not know of dear Alsace, over against Baden, where Pastor Horning at Strasbourg, where Pastor Magnus at Bischheim, where the dear singer Weiermüller at Niderbronn wield lyre and sword, and use the press to squeeze out of their opponents anguish-sweat and confession? — — Truly a visitation of God in the Rhine country, for which we should laud and praise. But the Rhine will be neither the boundary nor the only home of the newest Lutheran movement. It is surely to be hoped that other regions also will bloom with God's praise and the blessing of His Church? If by the North Sea, if from the Alps, a tone of joy of the Church shortly resounds, it should not surprise us. For this is certain, no church in our days is so full of stirring of life and movement as the Lutheran, and if men say that nowhere nowadays is there any more power to bring forth and to create, yet it is in heaven, and comes from thence to the most trodden-down and most beaten congregation, over which for 300 years all storms have passed, to the Lutheran. Of all this so few know, and so few hands are lifted to heaven to implore further blessing. Then we should like gladly now and then, as hitherto for the Lutheran Church in North America, so also for the building of the home Church, to encourage to prayer in these pages, — and because this little paper is also read in North America, it should henceforth give not merely churchly communications from and about North America, but also for the friends and brethren in North America, that the unity and the bond of truth and love between here and there may close a firmer union. The center of gravity of the Lutheran Church is still in Germany, and, as much as we lack, it will in the end remain in Germany after all. At least we venture to hope it, and the North American Lutheran Church can only rejoice in it. For whence is she? And whence does she even now still take her strength? What Americanizes her, does it not come from the land, of whose churchly conditions one entertains anxious misgivings?

Meanwhile, if we in Germany and the brethren in North America feel ourselves mutually gladdened through a common blessing of God, there unites us, besides the One faith, besides the new blessing of God, yet much else. We are still on this side and on that engaged in beginnings — want and misery here and there drive us here and there to concordant prayer. When Pastor Forstmann once asked a sick man what united him so intimately with his friends, he answered: "The common misery." So it is indeed also with us, the Lutherans of North America and of Germany. We have much to pray and to labor for one another. How many regions of North America, Central America, South America could use Lutheran help, and cannot have it on account of the poverty in laborers and in all that is needful. Of Oregon and California not to speak, to which both more than one hand is wont to point, when spiritual misery and need of help are spoken of. And on this side! How forsaken are hundreds of Germans, of Lutherans in France, in great cities and regions, for whom the spiritual Directory of the Lutheran Church of France, which sits at Strasbourg, seems to have no heart! And Austria, Transylvania, Upper Silesia, Hungary! What passes there for Lutheran! What does one know there of Union at a time when Satan would gladly once more unite what goes separated on a more peaceful path, what once united is hard to separate and then must nevertheless be separated! Ah, and Italy and Rome, where much noble Lutheran life succumbs under the blows of the Jesuits, who know all the faults of the state churches, all the folly of the Union, and know how to exploit them, — where there is no man to whom one could direct tempted, wavering Lutherans for clearing and strengthening!

May God help there! And if we should henceforth like to tell of God's grace in the Old World now and then in the American Communications, so we should like also to tell of the distresses of old Europe. In this sense we should like to cease to be one-sided — and to become many-sided, in order to awaken more love and delight among the brethren, and to contribute our share, however little it may be, to the unity of all Lutherans in the world.

So help us God to the new and to the old, to the writing from America for Germans and from Germany for America. His gracious blessing be with all our doing! Amen.

(Communicated.)
To an Unbelieving Soul.

1.

Thou goest forth to win the truth;
For thou dost long for her blessed beauty.
O that she herself might crown thy earnest seeking!
Yet thou wilt not reach the lofty goal
Upon thy way; — let me sing it openly! —
I am a Christian; though thy heart may mock me,
That I do not also follow the great multitude? —
I know not. Up, let us lift our wings!
Yet he who with earnestness would hunt down the truth
Fixes not beforehand for her place and bound:
He greets her with rejoicing, without even asking
In what form she may shine forth to meet him,
Therefore, that thy flight may not miss the truth:
Sketch not thyself beforehand her image, O soul!

2.

Nature, to be sure, makes a fair show in her halls of blossom,
And her fresh life delights us;
Yet she is but a creature; and higher must thou
Soar, to journey on to the eternal light.
Immortal one! ah, wouldst thou fall so low,
And cleave forever only to the mere matter? —
Nature would raise us above herself;
O hear her thousand-voiced song resound,
And follow her faithful call farther:
So thou wilt divine that a God dwells enthroned in heaven.
Then seek another guide,
To find Him who dwells in the light,
Take God's Word, the sure ladder to heaven,
That thy seeking may be rewarded with blessed finding.

(Communicated.)
☞ Since in many congregations of Germany and North America the original rhythmic church singing has been introduced again, the wish has been expressed from several quarters that the members of those congregations in this country might have in their hands, as a support in singing in church and at home, a little book of melodies.

In the name of the Lord, therefore, Mr. Lithographer Gast set himself to the work and spared neither trouble nor cost, in order to comply with this wish and to be able to furnish the Christians of German tongue in North America such a little book.

In three weeks at the latest the same will now be had, in pleasing format and with as pretty an outward appearance as is possible for the cheap price of 25 cents, under the title "Melodien deutscher Kirchengesänge in ihren ursprünglichen Tönen und Rhythmen nach Layritz" at the Expedition of the "Lutheraner."

St. Louis, July 19, 1851.

J. K.