THE MENNONITE BROTHERHOOD IN RUSSIA (1789 - 1910), P. M. Friesen, 1911

he always knew how to exploit the slightest opportunity to touch upon the spiritual condition of the individual and to direct him to the one thing that really mattered. Such times received their special appeal through a wealth of wonderful songs and melodies which he had at his disposal. Frivolous people, scoffers at the truth were taken aback and became serious; rough and insolent sinners became reflective; those, who were concerned about their soul’s salvation, quickly gathered around him from far and near; in the entire South; from Odessa to the Caucasus, from the Crimea to Kharkov, indeed his contacts reached as far as St. Petersburg; he was assailed from all sides with invitations and requests; and he utilized every opportunity that presented itself, not because of ambition, as he was frequently accused, but because he wanted to work as long as it was day for the kingdom of the Lord, whom he loved because He had first loved him. Whoever is informed about our conditions in the South, in the Evangelical Lutheran Church as well as amongst the Mennonites, will not be surprised at such an influence upon the hearts of the people. From out of the midst of these people, who are moreover also divided into various and sundry kinds of churches, voices are being heard which bemoan the deep-seated moral decay and call for admonition and renewal. Here in the territory of the [Lutheran] church, the masses, who had immigrated from various regions and who had by and large degenerated in body and soul, had first to be educated to a better order of things; that could not happen all at once; schools 210 THE MENNONITE BRETHREN CHURCH were established only years later and even then there was a widespread dearth of good teachers. Large congregations had only one minister (when eighteen colonies are served by one minister, and a sickly and decrepit one at that, can one speak of the spiritual care of the individual?), who, though he were a faithful servant, only too often lacked the necessary vigor and joy because of his isolated position and the consequent absence of fellowship with colleagues which could bring mutual encouragement and stability. The clash of spirits could not be avoided; unrest began to stir the masses; even the malice from below began to raise its head. Those, who fundamentally neither desired the faith nor wished to know it, to whom the Word of the Cross was a stumbling block, and to whom contrition and repentance— the circum- cision of the heart— was a yoke of the priests by which they bound people, rose in revolt; they claimed there was too much praying, and the call: Work out your salvation with fear and trembling— was regarded to be fanaticism by these people. ‘The church is in danger’— was the outcry of the day. They were not referring to the condition of the church which was adorned as a bride for the lamb and had its lamps prepared for the time of the midnight call: 'The bridegroom comes’—