Church History – Page 5 – What Does This Mean?

Wyneken Heads South to the Wabash

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 the 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 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 neighborhood of Lafayette, making it ideal for the placement of 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.

Showdown at Augsburg: Luther and Cardinal Cajetan

On October 7, 1518, Martin Luther arrived in the city of Augsburg, in obedience to the summons of his prince, Frederick the Wise. The Elector, nearing the hight of his power and influence, had arranged a hearing between his popular theologian and Thomas Cardinal Cajetan, the legate (Ambassador) of Pope Leo X. With Emperor Maximillian I dying, the Pope wanted to see Frederick crowned as the next Holy Roman Emperor to deny Charles Hapsburg, king of Spain, Austria, Hungary and territories in the Netherlands greater power. Frederick valued Luther and the prestige in brought to the University. He was determined that Luther receive a fair hearing. The Cardinal was under orders to pressure Luther to take back his challenge to the authority of the pope.

The Elector had the Legate’s word that the hearing would be fair and that Luther would not be arrested. Luther traveled on foot with brothers from his monastic order. At each stop, friends tried to convince Luther he was in danger of execution and not to go to Augsburg. Unaware of the secret arrangements, friends secured an imperial safe conduct, to the irritation of Cajetan. In Augsburg, the Carmelite monastery provided lodging, with a Wittenberg University doctoral student, the prior, as host. Two of the Elector’s counselors were present to advise him and his friend and superior, Johann Staupitz, was on his way. The city of Augsburg, a self-ruling territory, was already partial to Luther and provided subtle support and intellegence. Luther sent notice to the Cardinal and delicate negotiations began. Although there was good will on both sides, everyone knew that the aims of Luther, his prince and growing list of allies were at odds with the Cardinal’s commission and commitments.

Luther was looking for a debate. He would not give up his teachings unless convinced from Scripture he was wrong. He was not at this time opposed to the authority of the pope, but saw that popes had made mistakes in the past. He was coming to the conclusion that people could be sure of salvation when they have faith in God’s Grace given in the Lord’s Supper. The Cardinal was the chief defender of Papal authority and convinced that a believer must contribute good works to be saved, and, since you could never know it was good enough, a Christian could never be sure they are saved. A collision was inevitable and everyone knew it.

Friedrich Wyneken’s Missionary Journey

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.

Friedrich Wyneken in Indiana

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 woodman 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 complete 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. Due to this geography, Fort Wayne grew in spite of the economic depression that followed the Panic of 1837. The Northeast corner of Indiana quickly became a destination of choice for German emigrants in search of a new home. Fort Wayne was an ideal location fora 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.

Pastor Wyneken’s Lima, Ohio Ministry

On September 10th, 1838, Friedrich Wyneken stopped for supplies in Lima, Ohio. 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 of 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.

Meet Phillip Melanchthon

In the last week of August 1518, a twenty-one year old humanist, Philipp Melanchthon settled into his quarters at the University of Wittenberg as a professor of Greek. He was the great-nephew of the dean of German Humanism, Johannes Reuchlin, who saw to it that the young scholar had the finest education available. A true renaissance man, he studied the classics widely, including philosophy, astronomy, pedagogy, theology and the Greek language. Before coming to Witteneberg, he accepted his great uncle’s advice and translated his German surname Schwarzerd (“black earth”) into Greek, Melanchthon. He soon published a grammar of Greek that drew praise from Erasmus.

When Martin Luther suggested to Elector Frederick the Wise that he reform the curriculum of the University, the Elector accepted the suggestion of Reuchlin to call the young Melanchthon to teach Greek there. In his first lecture, Philipp argued that, to really return to the sources of theology, scholars must learn Greek and Hebrew. Melanchthon and Luther very quickly became the closest of friends.

The two scholars shared a boundless energy, a commitment to the classics, especially language study, a devotion the Holy Scriptures and to teaching. There the resemblance ended. Melanchthon was calm, mild-mannered, systematic and a consensus builder. He was tactful and not given to hyperbole. Luther was exactly the opposite. They complemented each other and built on each other’s strengths.

Melanchthon went on to be the author of three of the Lutheran Confessions — the Augsburg Confession, the Apology of the Augsburg Confession and the Treatise on the Power and the Primacy of the Pope. His work on pedagogy ended up reforming the teaching of children throughout Germany and remained the standard for centuries. He became known as the “teacher of Germany.” His systematic theology Loci Communes became the foundation for all systematic theologies in Lutheran theology — in spite of a reputation for compromising with the Roman Catholics and Reformed traditions he earned after the death of Luther.

We will have much more to say about this remarkable man as time goes on. For now, we will be content to note that Martin Luther has now gained an important co-worker, sounding board and ally. He is going to need his “dear Philipp” soon enough.

Meet Thomas Cardinal Cajetan

In the weeks following Luther’s summons to Rome, Elector Frederick played his cards carefully — and well. The German princes and territories were highly irritated with the way Emperor Maximillian and Rome had handled funds sent to them to counter the Turks. Now Pope and Emperor were asking for more funds to raise troops, but the Germans suspected that their cash would not go to the intended purpose. They resonated with Luther’s call to end the abuse of indulgences and their Humanist education and sympathies liked his call to return to the Christian sources — to the Bible. They were in no mood to send a fellow German to Italy.

Pope Leo sent a legate — an ambassador — of the highest integrity, Thomas Cardinal de Vio Cajetan, Archbishop of Palermo. Cajetan was a humanist scholar of the highest caliber, to the imperial diet at Augsburg to calm their fears and assess the health of the emperor. He was a well-respected theologian, an expert on the work of Thomas Aquinas still cited today. He was Master of the Dominican order and thus superior to all of Luther’s early opponents. He was a steadfast guardian of the power of the papacy, yet known to be a very reasonable, even-handed man, and a trustworthy, skilled diplomat. He was initially sympathic to Luther’s concerns, but also determined to convince him to trust the papacy to correct abuses. The pope had chosen well.

Since it was widely suspected that Emperor Maximillian would soon die, Pope Leo wanted Elector Frederick to be on his side. Frederick was the Imperial Vicar and would be the Emperor Regent until a new Emperor was chosen. Maximillian’s grandson Charles was his crown prince, and would rule Netherlands, Spain, Bohemia, Austria, Hungary, Poland, portions of Italy and Spain’s new world holdings. The pope’s anyone-but-Charles campaign favored convincing Elector Frederick to take the crown.

So it was Elector Frederick’s campaign to move the inquiry into Luther’s theology to German soil was successful. Five Hundred years ago this week, Cardinal Cajetan was commissioned to settle the matter at the Diet in the imperial city of Augsburg. The Elector and the Cardinal began negotiations for the interview, soon to be scheduled for early October 1519.

Wyneken Wanders in the West

“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 to be long and hard for the young pastor, who was not used to riding 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.

Luther Summoned to Rome

Five Hundred years ago today, Martin Luther received a summons to Rome to defend the Ninety-Five Theses. It had been a long time coming because their impact caught everyone by surprise — including Luther. The German monk had intended to begin a discussion among scholars. He couched it in the prevocative form all such discussions were framed, but he anticipated nothing more than rejection of the abuses of indulgences that everyone condemned and a clarification of the doctines involved. Instead, they were translated into Geerman and distributed throughout Europe. The conference was never held.

What did happen was a steep decline in the purchase of indulgence letters. John Tetzel, the Dominican monk that so annoyed Luther responded by attacking the theses as heretical. The Archbishop of Mainz forwarded them to Rome, recommending a repremand for the Wittenberg professor. John Eck of Ingolstadt, who was to become Luther’s chief academic opponent wrote and circulated an extended hand-written review of the 95 Theses. To Luther’s great surprise, they accused Luther of limiting the Pope’s power and did not focus on his challenge to indulgences at all. In doing so, they turned Luther’s attention to the claims of the pope. He poured over the scriptures on the subject. Luther composed an extended defense of his theses in February 1518. He sent his Explanation of the Ninety-Five Theses to the Bishop of Brandeburg, promising not to publish it until he was permitted to do so. He was given leave do so, but a disputation in Heidelberg delayed him until August 21st.

In Rome, Silvester Prierias wrote an expert opinion of the 95 Theses for the commission charged with investigating Luther. His Dialog on the Power of the Pope maintained that the Scripture got its power from the Church, that the Pope is infallible when exercising his office and speaks for the Church. So, whatever the Pope says about indulgences is true. Anyone who taught otherwise, he found, is a heretic. This document came with the summons to Rome. Luther printed the Dialogue and appealed on August 8 to his ruler, Frederick the Wise, Elector of Saxony, to arrange for his trial to take place in Germany.

Wyneken Wanders in Baltimore

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 withthem. 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 in Eastern Pennsylvania, and thus was unavailable for continued service in the West. During the Summer of 1838, Adam Wesel’s letter from Fort Wayne likely reached their hands.

Now that we have caught up with events 180 years ago, we will leave the saga of Friedrich Wyneken until another anniversary comes to pass.