# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1854 02 14_S101
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

101

Scarcely a decade has passed, and our dear confessional Synod, whose small and wretched beginnings can never be recalled enough, has by a miracle of undeserved divine grace and mercy grown into a young tree that spreads its branches in blessing on every side. Some 70 congregations already belong to our Synodical body; some 140 pastors and schoolteachers labor, constrained by the love of Christ, amid toils and self-denials of every kind, with zeal and faithfulness in the vineyard of the LORD, and even to the poor heathen at 2 stations the bread of life is broken through the service of our Synod. Two theological institutions have been founded under God's gracious assistance: a learned-theological one at St. Louis, Mo., which was commended to you for faithful and grateful remembrance, with its excellent organization of German thoroughness and soundness, only in No. 4 of this year's Lutheraner; and a practical-theological one here in Fort Wayne, of which I wish to add a few things briefly, for the information of those not yet or wrongly informed, and as a reminder to the rest.

Under the present circumstances our learned-theological institution cannot possibly satisfy the crying need for preachers adequately. For that it requires too long a time of preparation on this path; for that there is, all too often, a lack of the gifts of languages so needful in it; and for that, on the whole, alas, alas, still so very few parents give up their gifted sons. So necessity has compelled us to erect also a practical-theological institution here in Fort Wayne, since in a shorter time, at very small cost, godly young men could be prepared by a practical path for the service of the Church and school. This institution, which since its founding in the year 1846 has already trained over 60 preachers and schoolteachers, and continually numbers some 20 pupils, now consists of 3 divisions: a school for preparatory students, in which capable boys who either do not possess the means or the necessary gifts of languages, or are already too far advanced in age to go to the College in St. Louis, enjoy a preparatory instruction; a pro-seminary, in which those godly young men who wish to devote themselves to the service of the Church only in later years may acquire the preliminary knowledge they still lack or may train themselves for school service; and the theological seminary proper. The subjects of study for the first two divisions are: German, Latin and English language, arithmetic, geography, history, biblical history, catechism exercises, singing, instrumental music; to these are added for the pro-seminarians: dogmatics, the symbolical books, earlier Church history, catechizing exercises; in the seminary: knowledge and interpretation of the Bible, dogmatics, the symbolical books, comparative symbolics, biblical history, Church history, pastoral theology, instruction in homiletics, homiletical and catechetical exercises. All instruction is given without charge. The costs for lodging, heating, light, board, attendance, etc., amounted last year to only $20 per person, and, if the congregation here and the surrounding country congregations do not grow weary in their praiseworthy zeal in supporting the institution with provisions, etc., will hardly rise, but will probably be reduced still further. The washing is attended to by the women of the congregation here, and the mending, etc., of linen, laundry and clothing is done by the women's society here. Yes, only a few defray these so small expenses from their own means, but are for the most part supported, or wholly maintained, partly by members of the congregation here, partly by other congregations. — All this unspeakable benefit the LORD has done to us unworthy ones out of free grace, for who would be so unscrupulous as to ascribe the honor of it to another than to Him, to whom alone it is due? How then do we conduct ourselves toward such rich and undeserved blessing of God? One would think that hosts of evangelists would be trained, that the pious young men would crowd forward in holy emulation, in order, after faithful preparation, to sacrifice themselves in the service of the Church, to fill everything far and wide with the sweet sound of the gracious Gospel, and to provide their many preacherless German brethren in the faith in the forests of North America with Word and Sacrament. But, God be pitied, we are not yet even fully in a position to supply our own congregations properly with preachers, and to meet fittingly the need of the larger congregations for faithful, capable schoolteachers, a need growing ever louder to the joy of all faithful men of God, to say nothing of our being able to think of extending and enlarging the bounds of our so rich field of labor to the degree that we well ought and would.

In view of this great, heart-rending need of the Church I turn first of all to you, Christian parents of our body, to whom God has given capable and gifted boys. Ah, think of the unspeakable benefit the LORD shows you thereby, that He lets His holy, saving Word be proclaimed to you clearly and purely, and teaches you and your children rightly the way of life; think of the precious, inestimable blood of God, which for that very purpose your LORD and Savior Jesus Christ shed for you also on the stem of the holy cross; think of all the comfort, the joy, the peace, the blessedness which He has already dispensed to you in His gracious Gospel and in the holy Sacraments; think of the unhappy parents who in the old fatherland are, by the power of the State, penned into godless congregations or even abandoned to false doctrine, how they sigh and groan, and how they would gladly thank God on their knees and joyfully place themselves and all they are and have at His service, if they could have it as well in spiritual things as you have it; think of your scattered brethren in the faith in this land, who sit in the drought and thirst for the water of life, who perhaps cannot even bring their tender little children to Baptism, because far and wide no regular minister of the Word is to be found, who with fear and trembling see them grow up into heathen darkness, who together with them are in mortal danger of falling into the hands of the roving and running enthusiasts and of being everlastingly ruined for hell by the poison of false doctrine, — and then resolve among yourselves whether it is right, and whether you can answer for it before God, if from any earthly, trivial considerations you should withhold your gifted and, as a matter of course, above all God-fearing boys from the service of the Church. Are they not solely God's gift, which He can demand back from you in a moment, and are you not bound to bring them up for Him in the discipline and admonition of the LORD, and, so far as it lies with you, in any case to place them at the service of Him and of the common welfare, — why not also at the special service of the Church, the kingdom of God, which has such pressing need of it? Do not say: Oh, we can indeed be supplied with preachers from Germany, there are idle candidates enough there. I tell you: not Germany first, but we have the holy duty from God to provide for the needs of the Church here; not Germany first, but we shall one day be called to account for it by God. Do not object: yes, we must also be mindful of the bodily welfare of our children, but if we place them at the service of the Church, we deliver them over to want and misery, countless hardships and privations. You ought to thank God for it if your children were counted worthy to sacrifice themselves to Him and to His holy Church, to be permitted for the sake of the honor of His name and of His holy Word to suffer something too, for then their reward in heaven would certainly be great. Ah, consider well how you would have to be terrified if God took His saving Word from you, and you had to confess yourselves: we have only too well deserved this with this our indifference and our ingratitude toward the holy Gospel! How would you stand in the judgment, if your own children should one day accuse you that by such earthly-mindedness you delivered them up to the world and its service, or at least withdrew them from the service of the Church; if hundreds and thousands should cry Alas and Woe over you, because you, so far as it lay with you, robbed them of the pure preaching and the Scriptural administration of the holy Sacraments. Therefore once more I beg and adjure you by the love of Christ, consider it well, and break through all the petty earthly considerations that have hitherto held you back, to do your duty in this point, and show