4 THE CANADA LUTHERAN. THE CANADA LUTHERAN Published monthly in the interests of The Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada. PUBLICATION COMMITTEE Editor--Rev. N. Willison, Unionville, Ont. Associate Editors -- Rev E. Hoffmann, D.D., 213 Carlton St., Toronto, Ont. ; Rev. W. H. Knauff, Port Colborne, Ont. Business Manager and Treasurer--Mr. Otto Summerfeldt, Unionville, Ont. . All communications must be sent in to the Editor by the 15th of the month previous to publication. Subscription price 50 cents per annum, payable in advance, to the Treasurer. Send remittances by Draft, P. 0. Money Order, Express or Bank Money Order, not by cheques unless certified and payable at par at Unionville. Advertising rates on application. NOVEMBER, 1917. EDITORIAL. Volume VI.--With this number we begin volume six of The Canada Lutheran. It does not seem long since we announced the fifth volume and yet what an impressive series of events have been crowded into that brief twelve-month! The war with ail its stern associations and all its claims upon our lives has been ever before us. We have found it everywhere. Every newspaper and magazine has told us about it. Every street wiseacre has reviewed it for us. We have seen it in the khaki of our dress, in the bread on our tables and in our daily occupations. Daily visits of aeroplanes have reminded us of the extensive as well as intensive nature of the struggle. Casualty lists and cablegrams and memorial services have furnished the liturgy for our sacrifices. Brute passion, fiendish hatred, civilized--we shrink from the adjective--rescourcefulness have been the forces at work to promote slaughter. Like a terrible maelstrom this world conflict has been forcing us all by degrees into a mighty vortex of confusion and ruin. Despair would surely long since have overwhelmed Christendom were not the watchmen on the towers able to discern through the poisoned mists the light that still shines from Golgotha's height with all its blessed cheer. Utter exhaustion would overtake the wayfaring man could he not refresh himself at the fountain whence still issues virtue for the healing of the nations. About war we have read and about war we have dreamed but, thank God, we have also been able to rise above the war in prayer. While in the Spirit we have seen, again and again, the better things to be. The wrath of man shall yet praise Jehovah and the Spirit of the Prince of Peace shall have control. The events of the war have been tremendous, but the events that mortally wounded the spirit of war were greater still. The conflict on Calvary meant more to the world than all the clash of millions and the hammer of four hundred years ago dealt a mightier blow than any volley of modern guns. It is the hammer strokes for which we have listened during the past year in all our Quadricentennial celebrations. Like the rod of Moses that hammer rent the rock in a weary land and the great soul thirst of multitudes was quenched. It opened a Bible that had been sealed by Roman unbelief and offered the cup of salvation in the Bible doctrine of Justification by Faith. Salvation through Christ alone was the message from the castle door and because of this message we are still optimists in our view of world events. Because of this message we have celebrated the Quadricentennial of the Reformation in spite of the war and celebrated it even through the war. Because of that message a purged society has risen and shall continue to rise, immune to all the onsets of wickedness. To play its humble part to provide this end the Canada Lutheran has gone forth month by month and pledges its future service. Five volumes have been published. Volume six is now offered. Its thoughtful reading is all we ask in return for our efforts. Life.--"The just shall live by faith," is the precious Bible doctrine that Luther was permitted to restore to the world. It stands the test in every crisis. Not long ago we laid a sympathetic hand upon the shoulder of a dying man. We knew him not and had never seen him before. Death had almost closed the ear and the power of speech was gone. The spirit had almost fled. We spoke loudly into the deadened ear: "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be