Dear friends in Christ,
We continue our survey of Church History from the book of Professor E.A.W. Krauss from our St. Louis seminary of a century ago.
This month we continue our look at the beginnings of Lutheranism in what would become the United States as we focus our attention of Pastor H. M. Muehlenberg’s work in Pennsylvania. Remember, this hits close to home—Pennsylvania is part of our Eastern District and only about 12 miles from Faith.
43.3 MUEHLENBERG’S FURTHER ACTIVITY [Part 2]
Even after the Count vanished from the scene, Muehlenberg still did not have an easy job of it. The complaint that he had “expelled” old Mr. Kraft had already somewhat stopped about a month later when the German newspaper writer, Saur, reported the strange news that the 63 year-old Kraft got engaged to a 17 year-old girl in Philadelphia, but also flirted with a widow in Lancaster while his wife was still alive in Germany. But there was no lack of lazy and drunk schoolmasters who “cobbled together a sermon from all kinds of books and went about preaching and distributing the Lord’s Supper for payment.” Muehlenberg briefly abolished the occasional payments for sacramental acts in all three congregations to stop their godless trade, “because for those going around it meant only a couple shillings for the baptism and the offering at a communion”. Although his income was insignificant, he received a horse, which was necessary for his travels, from one of his three congregations, nothing from the second congregation and, from the third, not even enough to pay his rent. Yet he did not seize the 30 pound sterling that Pastor Boltzius placed at his disposal from the coffers of the Salzburgers. Instead, he wanted to spend it to build a church and he soon made the people in all three congregations amenable to it. He himself was content with food and clothing and wrote to London and Halle: “I have, praise God, no lack of food and drink and at the present time my clothes are holding although they have been greatly soiled because of the many travels. If I seek first the kingdom of God, all the rest will follow; for one brings me a sausage, a second a piece of meat, a third a chicken, the fourth a loaf of bread, the fifth doves, the sixth rabbit, the seventh eggs, the eighth tea and sugar, the ninth honey, the tenth apples, the eleventh pheasant, etc.
Especially when the parents of the children that I teach have something that they recognize as important, they bring it to the pastor. For me, it is not so much about the morsels but rather about the heart, if I can only win it by love. Only one matter greatly concerns me: because of the distances I cannot manage these three congregations because the work is too much; they are too far apart from each other. Above all, we still need one more preacher who absolutely cares about the kingdom of God. He must have faith, be firm in exegesis and dogmatics, show in his life what he teaches and not lack love and truth. If only the dear fathers could send a capable man, one of us could remain in the two country congregations and the other would have enough work in Philadelphia. I would be happy if even a catechist could be sent. There is enough work here; there is no lack of food and drink for the one who is godly and is content. Kind and believing hearts in Europe will help with prayer counsel and deed. If they want to leave me alone, I will end my course all the sooner and am happy when I have time off.”
This is what the 31 year-old man wrote several months after he came into the country. He faithfully taught school in the country congregations during the week days. “Mondays some parents bring me their children. It certainly seems anxious when children ages 17, 18, 19, 20 come with their primer; yet I am happy that the children have such a desire to learn.
A widow brought me her 22 year-old daughter. When she was seven years old she had gone to the English Quakers, had completely forgotten the German language and had grown up knowing nothing of Christian doctrine. I had to teach her the doctrines of the faith in English. In the evening several young fellows come to me in the school who really want to learn English. I read the New Testament with them in English.”
We continue to see this faithfulness in Muehlenberg in both the little things as well as in the big things, even after he received help from Germany and one colleague in office after the other had joined in the work. We soon find that his activity was not only limited to his three congregations. By his own choice, he also traveled to the scattered Lutherans in Germantown, Tulpehoken, Lancaster, York, Raritan, Fredericks. He was the adviser of badly served congregations, the arbitrator in disputes. Everywhere people relied on him. His talent in organization, his scholarship, but even more his unselfishness, modesty, dignity and godliness all combined so that everywhere people wanted him and he was dragged into a leadership position which he held until his blessed departure from the world.
However, like minded co-workers would not join him in this field of work before thousands of thousands of immigrants, among whom were many Lutherans, came to Pennsylvania. Who would serve them? Unfit individuals tried to force themselves upon them as preachers and caretakers of souls; they became evident and made the Christian, Lutheran name, stink and the godly, upright servants of the Gospel had to suffer under it. Couldn’t anything be done to protect congregations from such wicked workers? A union of faithful pastors and congregations would certainly be a means to that end. And it came to pass! In 1748 a Lutheran synod formed in Philadelphia. The members called themselves “United Congregations,” as their pastors called themselves “United Preachers.” We cannot follow here their undertaking and work, the delays and inspirations that were reported. But H. M. Muehlenberg certainly remained the leading spirit for all the good that this synod did; of course he also imprinted it with his weaknesses.
He entered holy matrimony on 22 April 1745 with Anna Maria Weiser, Konrad Weiser’s daughter who at that time was not quite 18 years old. In Providence, Muehlenberg later acquired an 83 acre “beautifully comfortable land for a pastor’s dwelling.” There he built a house, and here 8 of the 11 children, with which their marriage was blessed, were born to the couple.
H. M. Muehlenberg continued to remain in constant, lively correspondence with his European friends and patrons, especially with those from Halle. The Halle Orphanage published the news which he very regularly sent over and this vigorously preserved the interest of the fellow believers in Germany for the fate of the Lutheran Church in America. The Halleschen Nachrichten [News from Halle] brought, besides Muehlenberg’s “daily record” (later also that of his colleagues), also many “remarkable examples” of exceptional leadings of grace in which he was able to have insight.
So far Professor Krauss
LWML NEWS
We had our Epiphany dinner this past Sunday. It was great, enjoyed by all and, of course, we had lots of food. I want to thank all of you for your help and time, Special thank you to Karen for the meat which was great. Thanks again.
We will have a meeting on 29 January after church as we make plans for the year. Be sure to join us.
Our LWML Zone will be meeting at Faith on 18 February. We are certainly a vital group!
God bless,
Carol, Pres.
And all that generation also were gathered to their fathers. And there arose another generation after them who did not know the LORD or the work that he had done for Israel. And the people of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the LORD and served the Baals. Judges 2:10-11 (ESV)
“To be gathered to their fathers”? Here a special kind of family gathering is meant. A godly generation of Israelites died. Now they are in the heavenly dwelling with God, together with all who died in the faith before them. What a comforting description of death. It reflects the hope that every Christian can have.
In contrast, though, the report written of the following generation is terrible. They had forgotten God and turned toward dead idols, just like their heathen neighbors did.
These words remind us how important it is that we do not keep our faith to ourselves. Christianity is not a private matter. We have the commission from Christ to tell all people about Him. Here we think of people in other countries—and that is correct. But let us not forget those in our own family and those we live with lest we do great harm to our children, grandchildren, godchildren and acquaintances. Where should they hear from their Savior if we do not speak of Him?
It is too easy to lament how godless the world has become. It is better we ask: to whom can I, this week, share the good news about Jesus, the Savior of sinners? How can I with my own words and in my own life give a good witness of the wonder the loving God does to us? Don’t worry; the Lord will bless your speaking and works—on you and those who come after us. He does not only want to “gather us to the fathers” but also them: to the joyful family gathering in heaven He paid for.
Lord, let my life and conversation be a blessing for those who come after me. Amen
[Pr. Albrecht Hoffmann, in God Is For Us, 18 June 2014]
GERMAN/ AUSTRALIAN THEOLOGIAN HERMANN SASSE (1895-1976) NOTES ON THE PURE WORD AND SACRAMENT:
Perhaps the church of the coming ages will be the first to understand what service the church of the Lutheran Reformation has performed for the who of Christendom by this untiring testimony in doctrine and life: The Sacrament can be rightly administered only when the Gospel is purely taught, and the proclamation of the Gospel can remain pure only where Christ’s Sacrament is rightly celebrated. Just as continued celebration of the Sacrament keeps the church’s proclamation from ending up as mere doctrinaire theology, so likewise constant care for pure doctrine must protect the celebration of the Sacrament from sinking into cultic mysticism and magic.
Word and Sacrament, Gospel and Lord’s Supper belong indissolubly together, because Christ the Lord is present in them and through them builds his church on earth in divine omnipotence on love. This he does neither through the Word alone, nor through the Sacrament alone, but through both together.
[The Lord Will Answer: A Daily Prayer Catechism, CPH, 2004, pg. 414]
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IN HONOR OF BLACK HISTORY MONTH WE HAVE HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE HISTORY OF OUR SYNOD:
Only 30 years after its founding, the Missouri Synod began mission work among blacks, founding the first permanent church in Little Rock, Ark. in 1877. “Missionary Doescher began his work with an English sermon a few days after his installation at a mission festival at New Wells, MO, to which Negroes also were invited and came. Missionary Doescher first went to Memphis, TN, then to Little Rock, Ark., where he found a very promising field of work…. A second missionary, F. Berg was able to baptize one of the Negroes in Little Rock a half an hour before the Negro’s death, after previous instruction had been given and a satisfactory confession made of Jesus Christ… That was the first Lutheran Negro baptism and Negro burial of our mission.” (1878 Proceedings of the Synodical Conference)
Booker T. Washington advised Rosa Young, a pioneer missionary and worker, to turn to the Lutherans to help her with her work among her people in Alabama. She writes: “At last one day a letter came from Tuskegee Institute signed by Booker T. Washington himself. In this letter he told me he was unable to help me in the least [to keep my school alive for the benefit of my race]; but he would advise me to write to the Board of Colored Missions of the Lutheran Church. He said they were doing more for the colored race than any other denomination he knew of. He liked them because of the religious training which they were giving the colored people.” This began Young’s 55-year relationship with the Missouri Synod which led to dozens of black congregations and schools—including the predecessor of our Concordia College in Selma, Alabama.
Pastor A. Dominick from Mobile, Alabama spoke at the 1967 Synodical Convention in New York: “The bane of unionism is that it denies the truth by the act. Giving witness in a worship service, whatever the worship service might be… with those with whom we are at variance in doctrine and practice, whoever they might be, is not conducive to unity, but foments division. It is just this type of action that plays into the hands of Satan, who has method in his madness, and madness to his method… I stand… ‘contending for the faith delivered unto the saints,’ and ‘standing fast in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.’”
THE RIGHT OF SELF DEFENSE
Luther comments at the end of a sermon from 02 February 1539, admonishing the students: “In Italy, if anyone is found carrying a knife the length of a finger, it is off with his head. The peace of house, land, room, bed and table is a serious matter. When I was a boy, a servant one night challenged his lord to a duel, and the servant was killed on account of it. For the peace of the home is the paramount right; whatever killing is done on account of it, is permissible; there will be no consequence for him. The emperor and God have commanded and the prince reaffirmed the law. If a murderer falls upon me and wants to kill me, and I kill him, I am the prince of the land. The master in the land commanded it. I admonish the youth not to associate with the slop [Luther here refers to proverbial statement ‘Those who associate with the slop will be eaten by the pigs.’ That is, he who keeps filthy company will perish with it.] I have seen many murders in Erfurt, etc. As soon as one carries a knife, it is quickly taken in hand. All knives belong to the town council, because it has the authority and it is pledged to our prince, who alone carries the sword.” [AE, vol. LVII, pg. 388-389]
WHY IS THERE SO MUCH BATTLE AND BLOODSHED AND GORE IN THE OLD TESTAMENT?!
34 “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. 35 For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. 36 And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household. [Matthew 10:34-36 (ESV)]
Luther comments: Every battle and war in the Old Testament was a picture of the preaching of the Gospel, which must and will raise up quarreling, disunity, discord, rumbling. This is the essence of Christianity that arose at the time of the Apostles and martyrs, when it stood best. God’s word works a blessed strife, uproar and rumbling. Where there is true faith, the true essence of Christian people is once again the suffering and persecution. [17 January Wegweiser]
FROM OUR SYNOD—LCMS Stewardship Newsletter Article
We’ve all heard that stewardship is giving to the church of our time, talents, and treasure. This alliterative trinity helps us see that giving is not just about money, but about our whole lives. For God has given us everything we have and enjoy as we confess in the meaning to the First Article of the Apostle’s Creed. And what we confess first among those is that God gives us “our body and soul, our eyes, ears, and all our members, our reason and all our senses.” Only then do we confess that he gives us material things. Thus the time, talents, and treasure trinity places before our eyes the fact that we are to give something of all of these things toward the mission of the church in thanksgiving for what God has provided. For everything we have and indeed everything we are comes from God’s fatherly divine goodness and mercy.
The problem with this alliterative trinity comes when we replace one little word with another little word—when we replace the word and with the word or. It is always written with the and, but when we read it, we read it with the or. Thus this quite helpful trinity, which extolled that everything that we have and are is a gift from God and which is to be pressed into the service of God in His church, turns into a trinity that we can pick and choose which of the trinity we use into the service of God. The giving of our time, talents, and treasure turns into the giving of our time, talents, or treasure.
Then the question arises: Can we give of our time and talents instead of our treasures? Or perhaps it is the other way round: Can we give our treasure and not of our time and our talents? But these are the wrong questions. The right question is, can we give of our time and our talents in addition to our treasure? Yes, indeed, we are called to give of all three. The things that God gives us are not to be pitted against one another. They are given to us and we are to press them all into God’s service for benefit of His church and our neighbors in need.
Thus we give all three. We give our treasure in the form of a generous, first-fruits, proportion of our income. We give of our time in generosity for the benefit of Christ’s holy church. We give of our talents in the same manner. Since God gave us all these things, we are called to give generously of all these things in faith toward Him and in fervent love to our neighbors.
For God has provided all these things to us. Out of His fatherly, divine goodness and mercy, He gives us each time, talents, AND treasures as a means to bless those around us. We serve our neighbors with these things, blessing them with the blessings in which God has blessed us. We give of our time, talents, and treasures to our families, our society, and to our church, our local congregations. And we do this because we know that we are not our own. Rather, we belong to God. We have been bought with a price—with the holy precious blood and innocent suffering and death of our Lord Jesus Christ. He gave everything—His time, His talents, and His treasure,—to have us as His own and to live under Him in His kingdom and serve Him in everlasting righteousness, innocence and blessedness. We have these things as gifts and blessings from God. Let us then press them all into service for the sake of His love—time, talents, and treasures together.
FROM THE LCMS FOUNDATION:
Blending Family and Ministry Priorities
Personal priorities are often closely linked to family concerns. For Christians, spiritual precedence binds the importance of values we consider significant. Such unification combines the primacy of family and ministry motivations.
Throughout life, such priorities tend to show up in our actions. Whether laden with mistakes, or framed by good works, the priorities of our lives will be made known in the fruits that result from those actions.
God’s Word clearly brings family and ministry priorities together on the same road. We don’t need to look any further than the Ten Commandments to see ample evidence of this. It begins with the top priority - love for God, and moves to the second priority - love for our fellow man. All societies in history build on the foundational layer of family as the footing for humanity.
The beginning of a new year is an excellent time to encourage all parents with children to put in place or review their last will and testament that blends the spiritual priorities of family and ministry life. This is done using Christian preambles, charitable bequests and appropriate gifts to family members that will serve to bless and not curse them.
Parents with minor children will find it especially important to establish a minor’s trust to protect dependent children and to manage property or nominate Christian guardians who can be trustworthy in continuing consistent parental values.
Stewarding all of life includes managing risks that surround us during the days God gives. Preparing a Christian estate and gift plan should reflect a person’s priorities and merge family and ministry goals. If you haven’t completed your plan or updated it recently, you can give witness to your priorities for family and ministry by resolving to start, with our help, in the year of our Lord, 2017.
For more information, contact Robert Wirth, LCMS Foundation Gift Planner @ robert.wirth@lfnd.org or 716-863-4427.
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Tues, Jan 31 — Faith & Family @ 10:00 a.m. CST: Lutheran Camps & Retreats
Wed, Feb 1 — World Lutheran News Digest @ 2:30 p.m. CST: Recap of the March for Life Chicago
Thurs, Feb 2 —His Time @ 8:00 a.m. CST: Titus 1:1-26 with guest Rev. Chris Hull
Fri, Feb 3 — Thy Strong Word @ 11:00 a.m. CST: 1 Corinthians 2 with guest Dr. Martin Noland
YOU CAN TEACH LAYPEOPLE THEOLOGY...Issues, Etc. is a radio talk show produced by Lutheran Public Radio in Collinsville, IL and hosted by LCMS Pastor Todd Wilken. This week's topics include: Martin Luther's Last Year, The 95 Theses, Lutheran Higher Education, The Conversion of Paul, Companions of Paul: Timothy & Titus, Late 4th Century/Early 5th Century Bishop John Chrysostom and more. You can listen on-demand at www.issuesetc.org and on the Lutheran Public Radio mobile app
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