|Brotherly Support.| The Leipsic Society is famous for the thoroughness and solidity of its work. Its last report gives twenty-four main stations which lie chiefly in the districts of Trichinopoli, Tanjore, Coimbatore and Madura. It has also small missions in Rangoon, Penang and Colombo for the sake of the Tamil Christians who have emigrated to these places. In the southern part of its territory it is aided by the Swedish Church Mission. Together the Leipsic Mission and the Swedish Church Mission have fifty-eight missionaries at work. There is a Christian community of twenty-two thousand and there are fourteen thousand pupils in the schools.
The following description given by a young Leipsic missionary in 1890 indicates at the same time the enormous task before the Church and the courage with which the scattered workers are endeavoring to solve it.
|A Great Festival.| “On the evening of November 5th we went by rail together to Majaweram, in order to celebrate Brother Meyner’s wedding. This fell just in the time of the great Bathing Festival to which as many as fifty to sixty thousand assemble. On the chief day we went to the bathing-place, and looked at the matter a little more closely. There was a tumultuous throng; hardly to be penetrated. We were the only white faces among all these dusky multitudes. The best place for viewing the whole affair appeared to be the flat roof of the idol temple. We climbed up to it by a ladder, without any opposition. From here we could overlook the human masses; they stood close packed together, some bathing, some chatting, etc. We saw also how they were carrying about different idols, which were adorned with gold, silver and precious stones. All were greeted by the crowd with uplifted hands and loud acclaims. In view of this our hearts might well sink, as we beheld heathenism yet subsisting in its full, unbroken might. If we did not know that God’s truth gains the victory, we should despair of the possibility that India will ever be converted. It is an almost impregnable citadel of Satan, and the individual mission stations are like oases in the waste, and the individual missionary is as a drop in the ocean. For instance, in each of such cities as Sidabarum, Cuddalore, Cumbaconam, etc., of forty or fifty thousand inhabitants, there is only a single missionary! What can a single man effect over against such masses? Even yet it is only a siege from without--we have not yet made our way into the interior of the fortress. Nevertheless we will not therefore despond, but with fresh courage attack the task in the name of the Lord--you at home with prayer and gifts, we in the land itself by preaching the Gospel to the poor, blinded people, and attracting such as are willing to let themselves be saved. We know that the Lord by little can accomplish much. But Thou, O Lord Jesus, accept our poor, weak will, our slender strength, take also the offer of our youth, and fashion us into men, and into instruments of Thy mercy! Do Thou Thyself fulfill Thy work in power and bring hither to Thy flock them that are scattered abroad in the world, so that Thou canst soon appear in Thy glory and conduct us out of the conflict and strife of time into Thy kingdom of peace! Amen.”
A quarter of a century has changed greatly the situation in India. The siege has advanced nobly and many fortresses have been taken.
ALL INDIA LUTHERAN CONFERENCE IN 1914. DELEGATES FROM EIGHT MISSIONS.
|Another Brave Record.| The station of the Hermannsburg Society in India is in the southern part of Telugu land in the Presidency of Madras and the district of Nellore. This mission has a history of bitter opposition from the natives and cruel sufferings from cholera, but its workers have bravely persisted, longing for a larger force. After fifty years of work they write hopefully: “Our work in the Telugu mission is a blessed one. The plot is small, but it will be a great harvest field. Our preaching meets with great opposition, but opposition is better than a dull indifference. Had we but the means to offer salvation to the pariahs they would come in throngs.”
After fifty years the mission reports a staff of fifteen missionaries in twenty stations and a Christian community of more than three thousand. A leper asylum is one of its enterprises.
|A Promising Field.| The last of the German missionary societies to establish itself in India is the Breklum or Schleswig-Holstein Society. It had been recommended to work in the Bastar land, but the king refused to allow the missionaries to stay and they went therefore to Salur in 1883. Though the mission is still young, it provides for all varieties of missionary work, its schools are first-class, it has established a training school for native workers and a leper asylum and deaconesses are in charge of Zenana work.
The Breklum Mission lies partly in high land where the temperature is that of Europe. Here in the hills the various popular religious cults of India had not penetrated; the inhabitants were demon worshipers. Among them the Gospel has been received. To the missionaries it seems that dawn is at hand; in the words of one, “there is throughout the land a rustling as though rain is coming.”