# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1854 10 24_S37
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

37

den—that they might be a fruit of the labor of the holy ministry? With equal right an Anabaptist, in contradiction to v. 16, "according to the effectual working in the measure of every part," could prove from this passage that all Christians as royal priests ought to administer the office, for which a regular call is required: for if one wishes to connect "for the work of the ministry" with "perfected," the sense that they should all be fitted to do the work of the ministry lies much nearer than that they should become, through such preparation, a work of the ministry; if one will once allow to pass for a sense an interpretation which is sheer non...... .

K. Röbbelen.

"Now Christ here does not condemn the estates and offices, that one is higher than the other; for on earth there must be and remain such a difference that one is greater and higher than the other; father and mother over the children, the prince over the subjects, the pastors over the hearers and parishioners, as far as office and Word are concerned."

Luther.

"That one may plainly see, where God bids the congregation do something, and names the people, that He wills it done not by the rabble without the authorities, but through the authorities with the people, so that the dog may not learn to eat the leather from the straps, that is, grow accustomed to images, to riot even against the authorities. One must not paint the devil over the door."

Luther.

Whoever may be surprised that in the sermon which the Lutheraner printed in the first number of the current volume I name the teachers' seminary in Iowa among the institutions which have a claim to "the remaining crumbs," let him but look at the conclusion, and "the light of hope of which St. Paul writes" will cast light also upon that dark passage of my sermon. That seminary is as yet not against us; therefore love still hopes that it will be with us.

K. Röbbelen.

Communications

from a letter of Missionary Baierlein to our General President.

Madras in East India, the 3d of July 1854.

.... Even the greater part of those who were gathered out of the heathen here long ago still lack very much the right independence in Christ. Yet the work of the LORD prospers and goes forward quietly. Shortly before me two missionaries from Sweden arrived here, who labor in fellowship with us, and a quarter of a year later Missionary Meischel also came, so that we are now ten Lutheran missionaries here: 1 Württemberger, 2 Franconians, 1 Hessian, 2 Hanoverians, 2 Poles and 2 Swedes. We hold a tract of country from Madras to Puducottah of about 250 miles, and in 116 villages upward of three thousand five hundred Christians with 34 schools and 20 catechists from among the natives. Also in the past year 107 souls were again won from the heathen. So we have indeed every reason to praise God for His mercy. But when we look at the multitude of the heathen, then we must nevertheless say: What are they among so many? Would to God that our littleness of faith, like that of the disciples, might be put to shame. Yet we are men and speak after the manner of men. And therefore, when we look also at the number of all the Protestant missionaries in India, which amounts to 443, and at the total number of catechists: 698, and at the total number of Christians: 112,200, with 331 churches and more than 1400 schools, in which over 24,000 Christian children are taught, we must nevertheless say: it is like a drop in the bucket against the mass of 120 millions of heathen of this country. To be sure, if these Christians all stood in a living faith and were active in love, and if from the schools every year a new, ever greater and ever more capable number of native evangelists went forth, that would already be called a good leaven, from which one might hope that it would soon leaven the whole lump. But, alas, it is not so. I may well, who am not at all delighted with India, but find it a land of double strangeness, differ in my view from most of the judges of the conditions of India. And whether I have a right to this or not, you shall judge for yourself. It is commonly the custom to point to it as a sign of the times and of the influence of Christianity, that since the English government of the country has ceased to be a support of heathenism, which until a few years ago it was, to the eternal disgrace of its Christian name, the idol temples since that time fall into ruin without being repaired, "because the Brahmins (idol priests) prefer to put the money for it into their pockets." That the fanaticism of idolatry has ceased, since one may now attack heathenism without resistance and represent the gods as nothing; that the festivals are no longer so much attended, the pilgrimages cease, etc., etc. But whether one ought not rather to fear from all this an increase of godlessness than to hope for a turning to Christ, is a question which finds a twofold answer. The power of idolatry I also see declining, but the power of the flesh, of the complete being apart from God, that is, of true heathenism, I see in unbroken, almost growing power. Yet it is certain that at last the light must carry off the victory over the darkness. When and how that shall come to pass is God's affair, not ours. May the LORD make us faithful hodmen and armor-bearers in this battle! At any rate even now souls are being won for the LORD, who, sprinkled with His precious divine blood, are worth more than all the treasures of the earth.

The strange war, Christians against Christians for the sake of the Turks, against whom Christendom for centuries sighed and prayed, and from whom it had to suffer and bleed,—is indeed still far from the borders of India, but yet exerts a considerable influence here. "It is as if the empire of the heartless Company, brought together by injustice, maintained by injustice, were not far from the feeling of King Belshazzar when in the midst of his feast he saw a hand writing on the wall, although he did not know what it wrote. The greatest officials, who fear God, see the downfall of the British dominion over India drawing near, and that as a just punishment for the sins of the exhausting of the country, the oppression of the people, the support of idolatry, etc.

We who for ourselves, in order not to be consumed by the righteousness of GOD, must daily cry for His mercy, can also for our fellow men implore only mercy. But it often seems to me that dear GOD will yet have to bring about another order of things, if India is to be converted to Christianity. For to conversion in the apostolic manner, by the power of the truth alone, there is lacking, on the one hand, in us poor messengers far too much the power of faith and the devotion of love, especially as a false theory makes most missionaries into schoolmasters, whereby the preaching of the Gospel to the people is left lying, and one ever again indulges the hope of seeing a "better generation" grow up out of the schools, without letting oneself be taught by the failure of this hope through several generations that the family and not the school is the natural hearth of Christianity. Hothouse plants thrive only so long as they stand in the hothouse, and to make the whole earth a hothouse there is neither calling nor possibility. On the other hand, however, heathenism has also in the 1800 years become much slower and tougher, as indeed all sin grows hard as bone with the years, and the characterless people lack all energy, both to seek to know the truth and to give themselves up to the truth when known.

Shortly I shall move two Indian days' journeys from here to Sadras, where I shall dwell with my faithful helpmeet just as much alone among the brown and black people, as we dwelt at first alone among the red men at Bethany; and there news from across the sea will then do us very much good, and will also be a boon to us in our solitude.

I have asked you, dearest brother in Christ, for the "Lutheraner," and have the hope-