IMANUEL LUTHERAN CHURCH
Temple, Texas

July 1979

Dear Members,

Last Sunday afternoon I attended the 125th anniversary service of St. Paul Lutheran Church in Serbin, Texas. I sat in the un-air-conditioned balcony of this 100-year-old building and turned my bulletin into a fan and listened to sermons and songs in Wendish, German and English. Oddly enough - it wasn't the English which I understood or the German which I halfway understood but the Wendish which I didn't understand at all that most touched me. Especially the choir's Wendish rendition of "Abide, Oh Dearest Jesus." It's the mother tongue of my forefathers singing the gospel of Jesus Christ. It's the language my great-grandfather, Rev. John Kilian, born 1811, learned at his mother's knee. The Wendish language and heritage Rev. Kilian wanted so desperately to preserve that in 1854 he sailed across the sea with over 500 Wends on the "Ben Nevis." They landed in Galveston December 14, 1854. Pastor John Kilian's dream of establishing a Wendish colony in Texas was altered as later immigrants were mostly German, By the turn of the century German was the predominant language of this Lutheran community, and the Wendish language was dying out - so that at the 125th anniversary of the family of St. Paul, Serbin, only a very yew of the descendants of that Wendish settlement could understand the Wendish language. The Wendish heritage was still there - much of the superstition of the early Wendish settlers is gone, but the love of singing, the pride in their Lutheran roots, the importance of the church, and the worship, praise and service of Jesus Christ as Lord are still very much alive in the sons and daughters of the Wends.

Ironically, as I was reading the history of Zion Lutheran Church, Carlinville, Illinois - the congregation which has extended me a call to be their pastor - I noted that their second pastor, C. L. Geyer, accepted a call to St. Peter's congregation, Serbin, in March of 1976. The account of their history reads as follows: "After his farewell sermon April 23, he left for the Synodical Convention in St. Louis. There some members of his new charge met him in order to conduct him through the Indian country, as the railroad had not quite been completed."

St. Peter's was a breakaway congregation that was organized on the same grounds as St. Paul's, Serbin. As I was rereading that history in Ann Blasig's book "The Wends of Texas" I recalled an old saying "As times change, people are always the same." St. Peter's existed from 1873 to 1914 when it reunited with St. Paul's. Incidently, Blasig, in her book, noted the "five Godly rules" for attendance at congregational meetings that were subscribed to when the two factions were re-united:

(1) only one person should speak at a time
(2) anyone wishing to speak should announce himself
(3) everyone should speak on the subject
(4) personal things should be omitted
(5) no one should speak when he is angry

It is fascinating to review the history of our forefathers and to discover their humanness and their Godliness. By God's grace they have left us a great heritage of loyalty to Jesus Christ the Lord of the church.

In His service,
M. Victor Kilian