Omaha daily bee., 1919-11-02
Views and Rev1ews
I'm pressive Tribute Poid to q
Pastors Life-Work

do not recall ever attending . more i'm
pressive funeral service than that of Rev.
Leonard Groh last Sunday. Here was re-
tired Lutheran minister, no longer even at
tached to congregation, over whose bier
half dozen prominent peachers, including rep
resentatives of other denominations, poured
forth tributes of sincere appreciation of life
work truly exceptional. More than that, the
beautiful church, whose erection had been
made possible by the activities of the pastor
who had answered his final call, was filled to
overhowing, every seat taken and standing
room occupied with sorrowing friends who re-
manned as spell-bound through a two-hours'
service How many preachers in Omaha was
the involuntary mental question, whose death
would evoke such a demonstration of love and
respect and sense of personal loss?
Then from what was said could perhaps
gathered the partial answer. AS churchman
Rev. Groh was above all "a gospel minister"
He preached the word of God as he found it in
the sacred books not his own intermeddling
into secular affairs. His prayers sounded in
spired of God. His sermons were appeals to
his hearers to lead better life by needing the
holy word. not stump speeches politics or
pulpit-pounding harangues prompted by self
seeking upfters. That he was essentially "a
gospel minister" and that this was the secret
of his success and remarkable pastoral infu-
ence was emphasized over and over by all the
speakers.
Among other things disclosed by the eulo-
gles was that he had served one church back
in Pennsylvania Is years before coming west
and had preached to his Omaha congregation
No rolling stone listening for better paying
call" Again when the project of building
new edihce was taken up he himself headed the
list with subscription Of $1,000, which was
practically all the money he had saved, and
gave it freely with implicit faith that God
in NAV do Io
a word, he sought by his own course, by prac-
ticing virtue and teaching righteousness, to
mark the path he would have others follow.
In what a wonderful age we are living and
with what tremendous speed world events are
moving! The same thought comes whenever
we reflect upon what has been compassed in
the lifetime of man who like DR.. Groh, has
passed well beyond the proverbial three score
and ten. When he was born in 1888, Andrew
Jackson was the president who occupied the
White House, and Queen Victoria had not yet
ascended the throne He saw slavery then
fourishing in all its hideousness not only in
our own south but in many parts of the So
called civilized world. The locomotive was at
that time regarded as an impractcable toy and
the telegraph an incredible experiment. The
telephone, the phonograph, the automobile. the
tractor, the airplane were not even listed in the
dream-book. Nebraska was the uncharted
Great American DESERT, inhabited only by
buffalo and other wild animals and OCCASION
ally straying bands of Indians This preacher
of the gospel of peace and good will witnessed
our country's participation in four wars-the
war with Mexico, the civil war, the Spanish
American war, the great world war, too. Who
will dare to prophesy as to what will happen
in the time of those already born?
l have been reading to my children out of
Mark Twain's books Mark was a great hui
morist because he knew human nature One
of the chapters in "Huck1eberry Finn" tells how
"the duke" and "the king" corraled goody
pot of the realm in backwoods Arkansas town
by putting on show entitled THE Royal None
SUCH" On the hand bills executed for the oc-
casion the biggest type was used for post
scrip line, Ladies and Children Not Admitted"
with the result that the theater was quickly
oversold.
What's the applicationa
Why at the Powys lecture on "d'Annunzio"
before the Drama league, the realism OF the
Italian authors work was powerfully character
lied and his novels listed with the admonition
This one do not advise you to read"
| am told that book stores and public
library were unable the next day to respond
to the demand for dAnnunzio books