Church History – What Does This Mean?

Friedrich Wyneken’s Far-Flung Parish

Encore Post:

Wyneken did not remain idle while he waited for a dismissal from missionary service. He began his ministry in Fort Wayne and Adams County and preached to a small settlement near Auburn, Indiana, on the Cedar Creek, along what would become the Lima Pike Road. On the third of December, he set out for the Elkhart area, but found his horse too lame to make the journey. He spent Advent and Christmas in the Fort Wayne area.

Wyneken made a northern journey just after the first of the year. His horse went lame again, and he was left along the way. The missionary completed the journey to Benton on foot. There he baptized nine and formed a congregation. He continued on to Goshen, where he baptized a child and stayed overnight. Although he became ill in Goshen, Wyneken continued on to Elkhart, where he was expected. There he was able to preach, conduct a confessional service, commune eighteen and baptize six. His illness worsened and forced the missionary to remain in bed two days.
Since he promised to preach to a small settlement ten miles from Wolf Lake, Wyneken had to turn back for Fort Wayne.

Upon his return, Wyneken found a letter relieving him of his position as a missionary of the Pennsylvania Ministerium. During the eventful period from September 10th to the end of his commission on January 11th, he organized three congregations, preached fifty-eight times, baptized sixty-eight children and two adults, confirmed one, communed one hundred and eighty, married one couple, and buried one person. He collected contributions totaling $16.50.

Settling down to serve two parishes in Northeast Indiana did not stop Wyneken, full of zeal, from preaching, teaching, and organizing congregations whenever he had the time. When time permitted, he would respond to requests to visit other settlements on weekdays and preach there.

The circuit rider felt he could not organize these stations into congregations because most of them lacked either sufficient catechesis or piety and because he simply could not properly care for them. It broke his heart to have to ignore the many pleas to come and prepare children for confirmation and to meet many desperate needs. He could see whole villages sinking back into paganism. On his longer trips, sometimes four to six weeks from home, Wyneken had to depart settlement after settlement, sick with the knowledge that not even a survey missionary would minister in these places for the next few years

He could only promise to return from time to time and tell them of his many letters to Germany, begging for help.

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

Friedrich Wyneken Returns to Fort Wayne

Encore Post:

Friedrich Wyneken continued to travel north along the Michigan Road. At Logansport, he turned east on the Wabash-Erie Canal, passing through Peru and Huntington. He returned to Fort Wayne on the 16th of November 1838 and preached at that place on the 18th of November. After a six-week journey, traversing the northern third of Indiana and a portion of South-Central Michigan, Wyneken found a letter from the Executive Committee of the Mission Society awaiting him at Fort Wayne.

The epistle gave the missionary permission to accept the call of Jesse Hoover’s congregations, but only on the condition that he remain a missionary as well. His recent experiences made it quite evident that no one man could do justice to both calls. He dashed off a letter to Executive Committee, giving a brief report of his labors and requesting resident pastors for Lima, for the Elkhart area, for Bremen on the Yellow River and the Lafayette region. None were available.

Wyneken suggested that perhaps preachers might be found at the fall meeting of the Pennsylvania Ministerium or in the meeting of the General Synod. He recommended that such men also be able to work in English. In this epistle, Wyneken also asked to be released from their service as a missionary. He suggested that his former shipmate, C. Wolf, be called to succeed him as survey missionary. He included a promise to visit settlements within a sixty mile radius of Fort Wayne, as time and obligations permitted. Wolf declined the call and another candidate, Emmanuel Frey, was prevented from serving by illness.

Wyneken did not remain idle while he waited for a dismissal from missionary service. He began his ministry in Fort Wayne and Adams County, preached to a small settlement near Auburn, Indiana, on the Cedar Creek, along what was to become the Lima Pike Road. On the third of December, he set out for the Elkhart area, but found his horse too lame to make the journey. So he spent Advent and Christmas in the Fort Wayne area.

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

Wyneken Heads South to the Wabash

Encore post:

In very bad weather, on the 17th of October 1838, Wyneken traveled west to Bertrand and Niles, Michigan, along the present route of US 12. There he met several families, but was unable to assemble a congregation for worship. Finding himself once again on the Michigan Road, Wyneken returned via South Bend to Harris Prairie and Elkhart. He preached to them on the 21st, forming two congregations, one located in each place. Striking out across country along the present route of Indiana State Highway 331, he stopped briefly in Mishawaka to baptize a child. Continuing on his way, he reached the town of Bremen, a settlement on the north branch of the Yellow River. Almost all of the people of the town were ill with cholera, yet the circuit rider preached to one of the largest congregations he was to assemble on his first missionary journey.

Wyneken returned to the Michigan Road, traveling through Logansport to the
Wabash River. He could not locate the German Lutherans he had been told lived along the future route of the canal. Few of the people he encountered there were even willing to take information to their neighbors. Riding on to the southwest along the river, he entered the town of Delphi on a Sunday afternoon. Prospects for a worship service appeared slight. Finding only a handful of people who could speak German, he asked if there were Germans living in the area. He was informed that these settlers “belonged to no church.” Not a man to be easily discouraged, Wyneken made the rounds of the taverns, argued heatedly with the men he found there, finally dragging enough of them out of the bars to gather together a sizable congregation for an evening worship service. After lecturing them well into the night, Wyneken convinced them to gather in prayer on future Sundays, rather than desecrate the sabbath in the saloons.

The missionary continued on to Lafayette, where he had no success in gathering a congregation for worship. Following the Wild Cat River, he rode on to a settlement a few miles away. Here he discovered that six congregations existed in the Lafayette neighborhood, making it ideal for a resident pastor. After a futile attempt to find a congregation reported to be at the middle fork of the Wild Cat, Wyneken followed the Wabash River into Fountain County. There he encountered a road running along the present route of US 136 and Indiana 32. Taking this trail, he passed through Crawfordsville and Lebanon, before meeting the Michigan Road and turning north. There he preached to a congregation visited by Eusebius Henkel of Lebanon at the Sugar Creek in Clinton County.

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

Look for the Intended Meaning

[Fifth in a series of posts on how to read the Bible]

Encore Post:

In the Middle Ages, the most popular way of understanding a Bible passage was to look for four meanings in the text — the one the author intended for his readers to find, and other “deeper” meanings. The problem Martin Luther and the Lutheran reformers found with this method is that it allowed a person to find anything they wished in the Bible. So they insisted on a principle summed up in the sentence: sensus literalis unus est — “there is one intended meaning [in each passage].”

They observed that God used human beings, through human language, to speak to his people. To understand what God wants us to believe, we find that original message by paying attention to the words, sentences, paragraphs, grammar, and figures of speech the author uses. We look at the kind of literature it is (is it intended as history? Poetry? Is it a letter? A sermon? What were the customs of that time and place?) Most of the time we do this out of habit. When we do serious study of a passage, however, a good study Bible is very helpful with these efforts.

When most Christians talk about interpreting the Bible literally, they do not mean that we should always take it at face value. It means to understand it according to the words — what the author intended it to say to his readers. So, no one thinks that, when Isaiah said, “the trees clapped their hands” (Isaiah 55:12), cedars grew limbs to clap. They understand it as poetry describing how they move in the wind. When we read the Bible, then, we understand what it says as normal speech when the book is a letter or a history. We understand it figuratively when the literature is poetry, parables, or similar forms of writing.

So, this rule tells us to work to find the meaning the author intended to send. It is that message that God wants us to hear and believe. We assume that the passage has only one of these meanings, unless the text tells us otherwise.

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

Friedrich Wyneken’s Missionary Journey

Encore Post: On October 2nd, 1838, Young circuit rider Friedrich Wyneken set out along the Goshen Road towards Elkhart and South Bend (Now US Route 33). A severe cholera epidemic held Western Ohio and Northern Indiana in its grip at that time. Wyneken reported, “On the whole, from a human point of view, the time in which I traveled was an unfortunate time to work for God’s kingdom. Sickness raged everywhere. Often I entered a town where not one house was without a sick person: In many homes, everyone was sick, so that often my gatherings were very small.”

In Benton, Indiana, a town with forty German families in 1838, this deadly disease kept the size of the congregation down to twelve people. These settlers begged the missionary to return to them later, since they hoped to form a congregation. Promising to visit again, Wyneken continued on toward South Bend. At the junction of Goshen Road and the east/west section of the Michigan Road, near the town of Elkhart, and a few miles farther west at Harris Prairie, the missionary stopped to preach. He discovered many Germans in the area and resolved to return to form congregations.

Pressing further west along the Michigan Road, he traveled through South Bend and La Porte to Michigan City. Finding no German Lutherans to the west, he returned to South Bend and preached there on the 12th of October to a congregation of six hastily gathered people. Moving farther east, Wyneken preached again at Harris Prairie on October 13 and at Elkhart on the 14th. These communities asked him to return once more and help them to organize their congregations. Agreeing to do this, the missionary took the Michigan Road northeast to Mottville, Michigan, where he preached on the 16th and visited the sick. He baptized several children there the next day.

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

Friedrich Wyneken in Indiana

Encore Post: Friedrich Wyneken arrived at the settlement of Friedheim, near Decatur, Indiana, on September 20th, 1838. The first German he met in Indiana received the missionary with suspicion. “If you are an honest pastor, then go to that house over there. A very sick man lies in it,” the woodsman challenged. “If you are something else, like most pastors coming from Germany, then go over there to the rich wagonmaker!” “Nevertheless, I’d love to see the sick man first,” Wyneken quipped and then carried through. At this sick man’s home, he learned of Karl Friedrich Buuck, the leader of Jesse Hoover’s Adams County congregation and the pastor’s future father-in-law.

Wyneken ministered in the area for six days before riding north along the Decatur Road to visit Fort Wayne and New Haven. In 1838, Fort Wayne was a small but growing town on the Wabash-Erie Canal. This community of fifteen hundred sat at the portage between the Wabash and Maumee rivers, the only passage between the Great Lakes and the Mississippi River. At the summit, overlooking the merger of the Maumee’s two sources, Fort Wayne was the focal point of the effort to create a continent-wide water transportation system. By 1837, the Wabash-Erie Canal was completed to Logansport, a growing community on the Michigan Road. This road stretched north to South Bend and Michigan City and south to Indianapolis, Madison, and the Ohio River. Because of its geography, Fort Wayne grew despite the economic depression that followed the Panic of 1837. The Northeast corner of Indiana quickly became a destination of choice for German emigrants seeking a new home. Fort Wayne was an ideal location for a circuit rider charged to “gather scattered Protestants.”

Shortly after Wyneken reached Fort Wayne, St. Paul’s of Fort Wayne and Zion in Friedheim called him to serve as their resident pastor. The young pastor explained that he could not accept such a call without the permission of the Pennsylvania Ministerium. Since the missionary needed to continue his survey of Indiana, he suggested that the church council of Fort Wayne’s St. Paul Congregation write to the Mission Society for his release. Wyneken promised to return in four weeks to receive the Mission Society’s instructions. On October 2nd, Friedrich Wyneken once more mounted his horse and headed north into the forest.

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

Pastor Wyneken’s Lima, Ohio Ministry

Encore Post: On September 10th, 1838, Friedrich Wyneken stopped in Lima, Ohio, for supplies. There he met a German, who pleaded in tears with Pastor Wyneken to stay in the area awhile and preach to his countrymen and women, many of whom had not heard God’s Word or received the Lord’s Supper in years. With his heart breaking, Wyneken could not pass them by.

For eight days, he conducted services in Lima, in Putnam County to the north of Lima, and in Wapakoneta, in Auglaize County, to the south. With wonder, he reported that he preached nine times in these settlements and baptized fifteen people. Thirteen of them were older children, one an eighteen-year-old young woman, and another, the forty-year-old mother of two. He even confirmed a young married man, catechized but never communed. With joy, Wyneken wrote to Haesbaert:

“The people were so delighted to receive God’s Word and the Bread of Life once more, that I couldn’t thank the Lord enough for His love, because, at the very beginning of my ministry, He had led me to such hungry hearts.

Very reluctantly, young Pastor Wyneken left Ohio for Adams County, Indiana. “I regret now, that I didn’t stay longer with the Germans in western part of the State of Ohio,” he wrote the Executive Committee of the Pennsylvania Mission Society, “and did not visit more settlements, because there are no pastors there, and also, as far as I can tell from what I’ve been told, none have been visited by a circuit rider to date”

Impelled by a sense of duty, he forced himself to travel northwest on the Piqua Road, along the St. Mary River toward Fort Wayne. Wyneken’s route took him past Willshire, Schumm, and Van Wert, settlements he would later serve from Fort Wayne and Decatur, beginning in 1839.

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

Wyneken Wanders in the West

Encore Post: “After you had left me at the train station in Havre De Grace,” Wyneken wrote from Fort Wayne to his friend, Johannes Häsbärt, “I felt like a stranger in a strange land for the first time.” But Fritz was not a man to stay lonely for long. He continued:

This feeling lasted for a day, until I arrived at Zelienople, not far from Pittsburgh. I bought a horse there and trotted out through the forested land, cheerfully and joyfully. I felt much better then. Whether I was alone or traveling in the best of company, I could, any time I wanted to, merely pull out my beloved Paul Gerhardt book or New Testament and put them back in my pocket when I was done. Sometimes my heart was so full of the sweet, cheerful grace of my Savior, that I had to laugh, to sing loudly, to have a joyful heart and to praise my Lord.

The frontier forests of Ohio and Indiana moved many first-time travelers to awe and wonder, even if few of them broke into song. Hugh McCulloch, a future United States Treasurer, a young lawyer in 1833, described the Michigan Road as follows:

It was perfectly straight, and the noble trees, nearly a hundred feet in height, stood on either side of it like a protecting wall. The birds were sighing blithely, and although my horse was my only companion, the wildness and novelty of the scene acted upon me like a tonic.

Wyneken set forth due west across Ohio, along the present route of U.S. Highway 30, towards Adams County, Indiana, and Jesse Hoover’s orphaned congregations. Along the way, Fritz first experienced legendary Western hospitality, often being given directions, company, refreshments, and lodging.

The journey proved long and hard for the young pastor, who was not accustomed to riding such long distances in the wilderness. The roads of the frontier were not much better than trails, often still filled with tree stumps. The late summer temperatures weighed heavily on most Germans, unaccustomed to the heat. These conditions slowed Wyneken down, giving him much time to wonder if he was strong enough to meet the challenges ahead. He drew comfort that God was indeed strong enough to use him to seek the lost. Eager to bring the Gospel to scattered pioneers, he rode on.

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

Wyneken Wanders in Baltimore

Encore Post: In early July 1838, Friedrich Wyneken and Christoph Wolf wandered around Baltimore, looking for Lutherans. After mistaking an Otterbein Methodist prayer meeting for a Lutheran worship service, they found their way to Second German Evangelical Lutheran st. Paul’s Congregation and her Pastor Johann Häsbärt.

Häsbärt was also an “awakened” pastor, who had led a group of Lutheran and Reformed Germans to secede from a congregation served by a Rationalist minister. He was very suspicious of Wyneken and Wolf, since in America, laymen, con-men, and “every expelled student or banished demagogue” regularly preyed on unsuspecting congregations to make some quick cash. It did not help at all that the two young men brought no written credentials or letters of introduction with them. Yet Wyneken’s warmth and sincerity inclined Häsbärt to put aside his misgivings. Häsbärt’s fears were finally set to rest when Captain Stuerje testified to their character.

To seal their newly formed friendship, Wolf preached the following Sunday. Soon after that, Häsbärt fell sick and was confined to his bed. Wyneken served his congregation as substitute pastor for several weeks. Sometime during this period, Wolf went West ahead of his companion, settling in Marietta, Ohio. When Häsbärt had recovered, he tried to convince his new Hanoverian friend to stay in the east. Failing to talk Wyneken into remaining, the Baltimore pastor advised, “You must not travel on to the West under your own authority. I will write the Missions Committee of the Pennsylvania Synod, advising that they should send you out as their missionary.”

The timing was providential. At the 1839 Convention of the German-Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Pennsylvania, its Missionary Society met. The executive committee reported that in the latter part of 1838, Missionary Kohler had decided to accept a call to Eastern Pennsylvania and was therefore unavailable for continued service in the West. During the Summer of 1838, Adam Wesel’s letter from Fort Wayne likely reached their hands.

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana

Friedrich Wyneken Comes to America

Encore Post: What Friedrich Wyneken learned about German Lutherans in America sparked a struggle in the young man’s heart. Friedrich would later describe that moment to Candidate A. Biewend, himself on the verge of a decision to volunteer to serve in America:

Sadly, I have to confess that, as far as I know, neither love of the Lord, nor love of orphaned brothers drove me to America. I wasn’t even driven by a natural desire to go. I went there against my will and fighting the decision. I went because it was my duty. My conscience compelled me. It grieved me so much then and still grieves me now that I didn’t — still don’t–love the Lord more than that and that He had to drive me out to work like a slave. Even today, dreadful challenges and temptations, doubts and griefs come over my soul when I’m serving in my office over there. It comforts me, that I can say: “I have to be over there. You know, Lord, how I’d like to stay here at home. But if I stayed, I wouldn’t be able to look up to you and pray to you. So, then, I surely must go of my free will.

At peace with God and sure of his decision, Friedrich Wyneken obtained release from his duties as a tutor. After a memorable candidate’s examination, he was ordained with fellow candidate Christoph W. Wolf. Eighty-year-old General Superintendent Ruperti conducted the rite at St. Wilhadi Church of Stade on May 8th, 1837. With the help of Gottfried Treviranus, the Reformed pastor of St. Martin Church in Bremen, Wyneken and Wolf made the acquaintance of Captain Stuerje, who provided the pair of missionaries free passage to America on his ship, the Brig Apollo. Wyneken and Wolf arrived in Baltimore on June 28, 1838.

Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog

The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack

Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana